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Library of The Theological Seminary 


PRINCETON - NEW JERSEY 


6 <3) 


PRESENTED BY 


John Stuart Conning, D.D. 


Me SOUS Ur a Loo) ae ee 
Farbridge, Maurice Harry. 
Judaism and the modern mind 








| JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


sae 


} 


THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
NEW YORK . BOSTON - CHICAGO - DALLAS 
ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO 


MACMILLAN & CO., Limitep 
LONDON - BOMBAY - CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 


THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Lt, 
TORONTO 


JUDAISM AND THE 
MODERN MIND 


BY 
MAURICE H. FARBRIDGE 





jQem Mork 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1927 


All rights reserved 


CopyricuT, 1927, 
By MAURICE H. FARBRIDGE, 





Set up and electrotyped. 
Published July, 1927. 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
BY THE CORNWALL PRESS 


There are many in our time who have dabbled a little 
in science, and who are not able to hold both lights, the 
light of belief in their right hand and the light of knowl- 
edge in their left. Since in such men the light of investi- 
gation has extinguished the light of belief, the multitude 
think it dangerous and shrink from it. In Judaism, how- 
ever knowledge is a duty and it is wrong to reject it. 


ABRAHAM Ipn Davp (1110-1180). 


A religion that is small enough for the head is too 
small for the heart and, conversely, one that is large 
enough for the heart is too large for the head. 


A. J. BALFourR. 


In every age and under all conditions the intellects that 
set before mankind its loftiest beacons of thought and 
cuidance have reached their conclusions by means of the 
imagination, rather than by the hard and thankless 
eropings of mere scientific inquiry. 


S. ParKES CADMAN. 


Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2021 with funding from 
Princeton Theological Seminary Library 


https://archive.org/details/judaismmodernminOOfarb 


PREFACE 


The author undertook the preparation of this work 
on account of his deep conviction that a restatement 
of the position of traditional Judaism is urgently 
needed and sought after by many modern thinking 
Jews of today. Jews of today can be divided roughly 
into two sections: those who are always testing 
Judaism with an open mind and barely attain con- 
viction and those who are full of convictions but 
regard it as sacrilege to examine the foundations on 
which they are based. The earnest seeker after 
truth thus often finds himself in the utmost diffi- 
culty. He turns to one man and finds no faith, to 
another and finds no reason. Is this divorce between 
faith and reason inevitable? Is it impossible for 
the single heart and open mind to dwell together in 
unity? This is the problem which is agitating the 
mind of many modern Jews, and the author of this 
volume has attempted to provide a solution in these 
pages in a manner which he trusts will appeal to the 
thinking Jew of today. 

Again, the spiritual future of Jewry is a problem 
which demands most earnest and careful attention. 
Is there in traditional Judaism—that great organism 
and system of life in which the very spirit of Jewish 

Vil 


vil PREFACE 


thought and tradition has come to embody itself—a 
power of conquest, or simply a conservative instinct? 
Does it still hide, in the secret complexities of its 
remarkable traditions and beliefs, capacities for 
winning adherence, or is its vitality threatened by 
the germs of a speedy decay? Is its mission hence- 
forth to be limited to a suspicious vigilance over the 
simple faith of many of its followers, or can we still 
look forward to its rousing itself from that lethargy 
into which it seems to be falling? These are some 
of the difficulties which are agitating the minds of 
modern thinking Jews. . 

Many of those who “are at ease in Zion” fear to 
bring their minds to bear upon their religion, lest 
their hearts lose their hold upon it. Others again, 
fascinated by the absorbing nature of intellectual 
adventure and discovery, drift mto a certain 
dilettantism, and overtaken by the inertia of open- 
mindedness their convictions become nerveless. 
Judaism demands a passionate devotion joined with 
a cool and reasoned confidence, and it is only from a 
reasoned faith that one can expect the highest devo- 
tion. We need to realize that the maximum of man’s 
strength is reached only when the instinctive and 
the rational are set on one objective, and an essential 
part of our readjustment to reality must consist in 
the uniting of these partners, as intellect and intui- 
tion are united in creative art. As Evelyn Underhill 
has so well pointed out, “The noblest music, most 
satisfying poetry are neither the casual results of 


PREFACE 1X 


uncriticised inspiration, nor the deliberate fabrica- 
tions of the brain but are born of perfect fusion of 
feeling and thought for the greatest and most fruit- 
ful minds are those which are rich and active on 
both levels—so too the spiritual life is only seen in 
its full worth and splendour when the whole man 
is subdued to it, and one object satisfies the utmost 
desires of heart and mind.” * 

Unfortunately, many of the historic bonds—the 
Sabbath, the dietary laws, and other institutions 
which have been the means of preserving the sanc- 
tity and unity of Jewish life, are losing their hold 
upon many Jews of today. We are constantly being 
told that the only means by which Judaism can be 
preserved is by adapting its ritual and ceremonialism 
to “the spirit of the times.” But in the words of one 
Jewish preacher, “You may to a certain extent 
modify the outward form and ritual of your faith; 
you may correct your historical perspective by a 
deeper study of the past; you may plead for a due 
adjustment of the relations between morals and 
ceremonials, you can never reduce Judaism to a 
religion of mere convenience, offering a maximum of 
reward for a minimum of obligation and effort.” 

The Jew of today needs a new synthesis—a rep- 
resentation of Judaism which conserves all the 
truths his ancestors learned of old related with 
all that men have since discovered, and the only 
solution to the spiritual problems by which we are 


2 Faith, p. 10. 


x PREFACE 


confronted is to return to a more spiritual life. 
Religion demands its poetry and extravagances. If 
it is purely jejune and arid, it will inevitably fade 
as a living, sustaining force. We need spiritual 
enrichment as well as intellectual liberation. Too 
often the modern man is a prisoner in the thought- 
forms of his own age, but the really educated man, 
the true liberal, is the one who is liberated from 
contemporary prejudices and modes of expression, 
and who has enough imaginative sympathy to enter 
into ancient forms of thought as well as into that 
thought itself. We are simply intellectual provin- 
cials if we can understand nothing but contemporary 
thought. 

To reject the ancient formulations of Judaism as 
is being done by so vast a section of American 
Jewry is valueless: negations help nobody. Nor 
can we continue to welter in flabby sentimentalism. 
As thinking men and women we must gird up the 
loins of our “modern mind” to express in our way 
the great truths and experiences which the biblical 
and the Rabbinic writers expressed definitely in 
their way, so that Judaism shall not drift upon the 
rocks of intellectual confusion. 

Finally, the author wishes to express his deep 
sense of gratitude to many kind friends who have 
favored him with their liberal advice in the prep- 
aration of this work for publication. Dr. Cyrus 
Adler most kindly favored him with many valuable 
suggestions and criticisms, whilst Dr. Louis Ginz- 


PREFACE x] 


berg, the dean of American Jewish scholarship, 
was good enough to read through the work in 
manuscript and to offer the fruits of his vast learn- 
ing and erudition. Dr. B. Revel, learned principal 
of the Yeshiva College of New York City, also 
favored the author with various suggestions and 
criticisms on reading the proofs. The writer spent 
many pleasant hours in discussing some of the prob- 
lems touched on in this work with a dear friend, 
Rabbi Dr. Jacob Kohn, of Temple Anshei Chesed, 
New York City; whilst Professor A. Marx, Professor 
Israel Davidson, Professor Hoschander and Rabbi 
Dr. Elias Solomon also interested themselves in this 
work and favored him with their advice in many 
ways. To all he wishes to express his heartfelt 
eratitude. 

If this volume will prove of help in clarifying 
some of the problems of Judaism to our young men 
and women, the writer will feel himself more than 
amply repaid for what has been to him a true labor 
of love. 

Maurice H. FARBRIDGE. 


New York City, 
February, 1927. 





CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 
J. JupaAisM AND Some oF irs Mopern Supsti- 
U2 Rig W Ors a oh Oe gay aa UA i 
II. Tur GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 
III. Brste Dirricuttizs—Morat AND SCIENTIFIC 
IV. JupAISM AND MiracheS .. . 
V. JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 
VI. Is THe Brsie INSPIRED? 
VII. Jewish Trapitrion—Its NatTuRE AND Sic- 
NIFICANCE 
VIII. THe AvutuHority or JEwisH TRADITION . 
IX. SHoutD We CHANGE Our Form oF SmRvicH? 
X. SUMMARY 


INDEX 





So long as there are depths in our natures which the 
intellect has not plumbed, and shady places where no 
light of science has penetrated, we are justified in look- 
ing to our natures in their wholeness, and to those human 
or divine hopes and aspirations which, through the long 
panorama of history, by thorny and uneven paths seem 
to have led on and upward. These we will still include 
within the data of our judgments upon life. 


H. O. Taytor: Freedom of the Mind in History. 





JUDAISM AND THE MODERN 
MIND 


CHAPTER I 


JUDAISM AND SOME OF ITS MODERN SUBSTITUTES 


The modern mind—The tendencies of our age blunt and thwart 
the appeal which Judaism made to our fathers—Materialism 
—Agnosticism—The trend of modern thought is to relate 
theology more and more closely to psychology—Ethical Cul- 
ture—Rationalism—Different economic systems suggested— 
The prophetic doctrines of ancient Israel—Varying explana- 
tions of the universe by scientists. 


THE term “modern mind” is very commonly used 
in everyday life without an attempt even being made 
to understand its meaning. To some who use the 
term very loosely and superficially, the modern mind 
is the mind which identifies itself with every fad 
and eccentricity which it may hear of, and is often 
a mood, a temper, a prejudice, rather than a mind. 
To others again the modern mind is a mind thor- 
oughly rationalistic, unduly influenced by the dog- 
matic attitude of many modern scientists and more 
interested in destroying than in building up. But a 
careful consideration of the lives and opinions of 
our greatest modern thinkers shows clearly that the 
modern mind is less rationalistic and more mystic 
than is popularly supposed. 

3 


4 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


The attitude of the mind which is truly “modern” 
is connected with prominent modern conceptions 
which are applied to and made fundamental to every 
aspect of life. It is imbued with the desire and 
effort to find a new synthesis consistent with the 
data of critical research, and thus seeks to conform 
everything of a religious nature in both the natural 
and spiritual realms, that it may think, act, and 
worship in accord with the spirit of the twentieth 
century. 

We are told that “where there is a mind, there 
are order and system, correlation and proportion, a 
harmonizing of forces, and an interconnection of 
parts.” Thus Professor L. T. Hobhouse, in his work 
Mind in Evolution, writes: “The growth of mind 
in life is manifested in the wider-and more subtie 
interconnection of what is otherwise separate and 
even inconsistent. The use of reason is a swelling 
harmony which gradually subdues discord and uses 
it to its own ends. To the true rationalism, the 
supreme reason is no dry pedant, living apart and 
blighting the free, spontaneous life of impulse, but 
the animating spirit that impenetrates experience 
and gives to its otherwise scattered fragments, new 
and harmonious being.” 

Similarly, Henry Osborne Taylor, in his Freedom 
of the Mind in History, writes: “For the larger 
judgments and decisions of life, the final criterion of 
truth and value lies in the total sum of our experi- 
ence. Regard must be had to the totality, if not the 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM = 5 


wholeness of our natures, in which our faculties are 
bound together, and either cooperate or act as checks 
upon each other. The different faculties subtly or 
palpably affect each other’s behaviour, or combine, 
or dovetail in their contribution to human actions 
and reactions. Each faculty has a validity of its 
own and may claim to count in the estimate of 
human welfare, and in the determination of what is 
true as well as what is right, for man.” 

The real modern mind thus realizes that, whilst 
conceptions of growth, of development, of evolution, 
and of progress dominate thought today, and we 
certainly must give these conceptions rein in our 
search for further knowledge, it is for us to employ 
all the faculties of man, and all the means of ascer- 
tainment and suggestion within our reach. This 
interconnection between all branches of thought and 
feeling has been emphasized particularly during the 
last half century, and one notes especially how all 
departments of knowledge are becoming an organic 
unity.’ In education, for example, there has been a 
growing obliteration of the sharp dividing line which 
used to be drawn round each separate department 
of study. Similarly, in religion, we are told that 
the modern mind stands fundamentally for “unifica- 
tion of thought,” * for it is “the same mind that has 
to think of things secular and of things sacred and 
the processes of thinking for both are the same. 


1 Gwatkin, The Knowledge of God, Vol. II, p. 270. 
* Dr. Sanday, The Position of Liberal Theology. 


6 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


What are called the ‘laws of thought’ are applicable 
alike to both.” 

Within recent years there has been considerable 
negligence of, and in some cases even opposition 
to, traditional Jewish practice and observances, 
and we are constantly being told that this is due 
to the fact that traditional Judaism is unacceptable 
to the modern mind. The traditional Jew may feel 
that this superficial opposition to his outlook on 
Jewish thought is merely a phase and that the 
inability to understand his sacred principles will 
pass, is perhaps already passing, in the deepening 
feeling, thought, and culture of the age. Neverthe- 
less, many of us feel that the time has arrived when 
_ we can no longer live spiritually from hand to mouth, 
but must consider whether our religion is in accord 
with the true modern mind, and must account for 
ourselves as Jews, and must explain, at least to 
ourselves if not to humanity at large, our reasons 
for remaining loyal to our traditional observances 
and ceremonials. 

We are living in a critical age, a fact which 
whether we deplore or praise necessitates that every 
branch of knowledge, every system of life, if it is to 
be assigned some rank in the hierarchy of science, 
must justify itself by showing the part it plays in 
the development of human thought and culture. 
As Jews we have no outward means of maintaining 
our power such as have the great religions which 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 7 


are firmly rooted in various parts of the world, and 
yet, living as we do everywhere, in the minority; 
persecuted and downtrodden as we are in many parts 
of the world; disliked almost everywhere, welcomed 
nowhere, it is only natural that we should ask our- 
selves whether it is really advisable for us to remain 
as Jews and whether we should continue to main- 
tain some of those ceremonials and observances 
which many of us are clamoring to lay aside as 
“obsolete survivals of a sad past.” 

But even many of us who wish to remain Jews 
feel that there are struggling within us two conflict- 
ing considerations. On the one hand, we dread 
stagnation, particularly that form of stagnation 
which smothers the very root sources of our spiritual 
life. On the other hand we fear the dangers of 
advancing at too great a pace. The desire for 
adherence to the precious heritage of our fathers, 
the fear of incurring the guilt of leaving the spiritual 
heritage to which we are bound by our heartstrings, 
claims us In one direction; in another we feel the 
desire to attach ourselves to modern ideas and sys- 
tems of thought so different from those which were 
known and accepted by our forefathers. 

We seem to hear on all sides that traditional 
Judaism is out of harmony with the “spirit of the 
times.” And it is for us to examine this assertion 
and consider its meaning. What do our opponents 
mean by the “spirit of the times?’ Do they refer 


8 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


to the materialism and hedonism which is so char- 
acteristic of this age? If so, we have nothing to be 
ashamed of. Nay, we even glory in the fact that 
our conception of Judaism is out of harmony with 
the hedonism of today. But if our opponents mean 
to imply that our conceptions of Jewish thought 
are out of harmony with the modern ideas of 
humanity and progress, then we boldly challenge 
that assertion. 

It is useless for many teachers of traditional 
Judaism to continue the attitude they have taken 
hitherto and content themselves with scolding and 
scorning those who do not agree with their views 
and practices. Whether we are observant or non- 
observant Jews, we are all men and women who 
have to live in the same world, and we are all of us 
compelled to live by certain instincts and intuitions 
which we cannot always explain. 

In this serious business of life, misunderstanding 
is a mighty loss, and in order to avoid it we must 
get deeper than this epigrammatic sparring which 
has characterized both sides and consider our case 
with fairness and frankness. The time has gone 
by for facile apologetic on the one side and con- 
temptuous dismissal on the other. The increasing 
pressure of common problems in every aspect of 
life—religion, education, ethics—demands of us a 
sustained effort to understand one another, and this 
must be done with the utmost readiness and good 
will. Let us approach the problem with the hope 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 9 


that the modern mind, with all its difficulties, is at 
least no more incapacitated than any other type of 
mind from accepting traditional Judaism, that its 
aspirations and tendencies are in favor of establish- 
ing the Kingdom of God on earth, although in its 
intuitions and difficulties it is dimly conscious of 
defects which are not wholly on one side. 

I have referred to the usual superficiality which, 
in most cases, characterize the so-called modern- 
mind, and I may be replied to with the argument, 
“Ts not our system of religion equally superficial?” 
If the modern mind is simply indifferent to religion, 
is it not because religion is simply indifferent to the 
modern mind? That the tendencies of our age— 
whether we describe them as intellectual or instinc- 
tive—blunt and thwart the appeal which Judaism 
made to our fathers, we must all readily admit. Of 
course religion has always to contend with difficul- 
ties. It has to appeal to that side of man which 
is generally the weakest, and offers something which 
seems utterly impalpable until that side of his 
nature awakens in strength. The arguments which 
it has to use are consciously or unconsciously deter- 
mined by the weakness of man’s spiritual apprecia- 
tion, with the result that the moment his spiritual 
nature is touched these very arguments become 
difficulties. The arguments most successful in win- 
ning men in one generation thus become the greatest 
hindrance to faith in the next. In fact, the peculiar 
difficulties of our own age may be due in some 


10 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


cases to this very cause, and therefore traceable 
not so much to anti-religious bias as to a definite 
advance in spiritual apprehension. 

It is generally agreed that materialism has been 
slain in the high places of philosophic encounter and 
its shield vilely cast away, and within recent times 
especially there has been a remarkable revival of 
religious sentiment and an increased demand for a 
spiritual explanation of existence, features of which 
ean be seen in the attractiveness of such doctrines 
as Theosophy, Christian Science, and Spiritualism. 

Nevertheless, we must all admit that in numerous 
instances there often exists a core of indifference 
toward the higher spiritual issues and realities with 
which religion is concerned. Whether this is due 
in most cases to moral or deliberate rebellion against 
truth is a matter which cannot be discussed funda- 
mentality in these pages. But we are also aware 
of the fact that there are many ‘‘modern-minded” 
faithful seekers of the truth who meet with con- 
siderable difficulty in their attempts to grasp the 
fundamentals of traditional Judaism. Their lack of 
success seems to be due in most instances to their 
efforts to find the foundations of Jewish thought in 
everything — hygiene, psycho-analysis, national 
economy—everything except Judaism. Here lies 
the cause of their failure. 

We are told that our religious leaders can meet 
the situation only by using terms which the modern 
mind can understand. But how is this to be done 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 11 


where the elements which make up that mind are so 
diverse, confused and independent? Are we not so 
far from a central appeal and common understand- — 
ing that we should have to prepare a_ different 
apologetic for almost every individual mind? To 
succeed in such an attempt is of course beyond the 
bounds of human possibility. But perhaps one 
method of solving the problem would be for us to 
consider briefly how far the doctrines which have 
been propagated amongst certain sections of Jews 
within recent years as means of supplanting tradi- 
tional Judaism are acceptable. For, as we have 
already noted, although the doctrine of materialism 
has been destroyed, it has been supplanted in many 
instances by such teachings as Agnosticism, Ethical 
Culture, Rationalism, and, chiefly amongst a large 
section of the Jewish working classes, by Socialism. 
Let us, therefore, proceed to a brief analysis of 
these doctrines. 

The term “agnosticism” was coined by Huxley 
and adopted by Herbert Spencer for a system of 
thought which deals exclusively with things that 
come under our observation, discarding all matters 
pertaining to the spiritual life of man, such as God, 
soul, eternity and free will, because they lie outside 
of our ken and surpass our understanding. Its 
watchword is, “We know nothing about these 
things.” Now, if this were but an humble admission 
of the limitations of all human knowledge, we would 
all be agnostics, for the fact that “no man can see 


12 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


God and live” is constantly brought home to even 
the wisest of humanity who realizes the truth of the 
biblical statement, “Thou canst not by searching 
find out God. It is as high as Heaven. What canst 
thou do? It is as deep as the nether world. What 
eanst thou know?” One is reminded also of the 
words of Joshua ben-Chanania to the Emperor 
Hadrian: “You cannot look at the sun when shin- 
ing in full splendor without being dazzled; how 
can you expect to behold the majestic center of all 
life and grandeur without being bewildered?” On 
the other hand, seeing that the human mind, like 
nature, abhors a vacuum, mortal man has invested 
certain signs and symbols with concrete forms of life 
and personality as feeble attempts of his finite mind 
to grasp the great infinite and to make the invisible 
world somewhat comprehensive thereby. 

The great philosopher Immanuel Kant emphasized 
that whatever we perceive and know of the world of 
matter must have come through the medium of the 
human intellect, to be coined into current forms of 
perception in order to come within our reach, whilst 
“the thing itself,’ that which actually exists and 
transpires, can never be known. This is the grain 
of truth in Spencer’s agnosticism. 

We are even prepared to admit that agnosticism 
has at times been beneficial to mankind by acting as 
a necessary restraint upon spiritualistic as well as 
theological assumptions. Whenever the weird 
speculations of childlike ages and the unrestrained 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 18 


flights of faith have distorted a popular belief con- 
cerning God, heaven, the soul, and immortality, 
agnosticism has come forward to temper their pre- 
sumptuousness and chasten their moods. In so far 
we are prepared to concede the advantage of 
agnosticism. As soon, however, as it is formed into 
a positive system, it becomes mischievous and 
dangerous. 

The person we nowadays meet with, openly 
describing himself as an agnostic, is usually one who 
has not even read Herbert Spencer’s First Principles 
but is attempting to hide himself under sheer mental 
laziness. He tells us that he cannot understand our 
description of the Godhead, the meaning of the term 
“divine,” or the topographic scheme of the next 
world; nor can he find the meaning of certainty 
either in science, philosophy, or revelation. The 
agnostic does not realize that man does.live by 
unseen realities and that the seen and visible only 
mock our deepest needs. As a matter of fact, even 
Spencer regards the unseen as the more real of the 
two realms and derives our judgments on the imper- 
fections of the visible and finite from our sense of 
the invisible and the infinite. 

We have realized that the famous saying of Hegel, 
“The real is the rational,” is untrue and needs to be 
modified. It is the religious which is the real. Where 
do we discover reality? Surely not in mere intel- 
lectuality. No! It is in moral faith and adventure 
that reality is to be discovered. The agnostic needs 


14 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


to be reminded of Spencer’s great saying, that our 
knowledge of our ignorance is part of our conception 
of truth. We all have a positive knowledge of the 
infinite although many of us do not realize it and 
merely use it to criticize the imperfections of others. 
How often are we told by various people that they 
have no knowledge of God; yet the next moment 
these people may perhaps criticize their neighbor 
by the standard of an absolute, perfect ideal. True, 
they do not worship that ideal but they use it to 
scarify every friend and enemy they have. In 
other words, the illegitimate use of our sense of the 
infinite makes us critics instead of religionists. 

It is not true that God is unknowable although 
science cannot scan Him and I cannot even trace 
Him with my mind. For I find God in my con- 
science. I find him in the never-silenced voice of 
duty, telling me “Thou shalt” and “Thou shalt not.” 
I find Him in truth, justice, kindness, and love, 
which are the very manifestations of His power and 
by which His small, silent voice makes itself heard 
and felt. As I watch the rise and fall of empires 
and races I recognize at once the power that makes 
for righteousness. Yea, I know God by the divine 
life which is in me. 

The trend of modern thought is to relate theology 
more and more closely to psychology, to lay greater 
emphasis upon the fact that the temple of truth is 
being built up out of the data of human experience, 
and that the foundations of that temple must be 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 15 


sought in the laws that govern the structure of our 
own mental life. Particularly during the last quarter 
of a century many psychological terms have been 
making their way into the vocabulary of religion, 
and it is being realized more and more that the idea 
of God which is the central conception of theology 
is subject to the same law of mental life as are all 
other ideas, and there is but one science of 
psychology applicable to it. 

We are all agreed that man comes upon the 
scene of life endowed with a certain number of 
instincts—inherited tendencies to act in certain 
ways under certain stimuli. These activities result 
in consciousness and the consciousness thus acquired 
makes possible our various emotions. Now, the 
religious consciousness is infinitely varied in its con- 
tent, but throughout all its variations it persistently 
maintains a valuational attitude in relation to what 
it regards at the moment as vital and ultimate. Its 
distinguishing feature is thus to be found in its 
attitude and its end rather than in its content. Not 
only is it enormously extensive and intensive, but it 
is also so mobile and complex as to make all 
mechanical analysis impossible. 

The ancient Anatolian dancing around a spear 
stuck in the ground, the Australian shouting 
“Daramulum, Daramulum!”’ Spinoza adoring the 
“Absolute Infinity,’ or Isaiah exclaiming ‘Holy, 
Holy, Holy!” are merely different representations of 
the religious instinct In man. 


16 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Max Miiller finds the origin of all religion in 
man’s innate perception of the universe, and H. R. 
Marshall writes: “If an appeal to common sense 
be of any value we do not need to look far for an 
affirmation of the instinctive nature of religion. I 
find by questioning that intelligent people very 
generally reply affirmatively, if asked whether they 
consider religion to be instinctive; and philosophic 
writers are also often found taking the same position. 

Let us assume, in the first place, that a reli- 
gious instinct exists which, broadly speaking, is 
developed in all mankind.” The point to note, how- 
ever, is that the religious consciousness is not the 
expression of one primary instinct but of many 
instincts all centering around the one passion for 
the fullness of life. All our inherited tendencies or 
instincts are dominated by one central impulse— 
the will to live. 

We encounter a “religion” of beauty, a “religion” 
of science, a “religion” of duty, a “religion” of social 
enthusiasm, each of which has shaken off the form of 
all historical religions. What does all this mean 
but that with life comes also the craving for life—a 
craving consisting of various values all of which 
press for organization into one united whole which 
we call religion. “What men call religion is, at its 
focal points, a reaction, solemn or joyous, in which 
the individual or the group concentrates attention 
upon something so important, that it is, for the 
consciousness of the moment, life itself . . . so that 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 17 


wherever men identify themselves with something 
as their very life, there you almost certainly find 
‘religion’ the descriptive term.” 

Professor Pratt, in his Psychology of Religious 
Belief, imagines an inhabitant of Mars paying a 
visit to this planet, and as he travels from one 
country to another and notices the different customs 
and habits of the people he would observe one habit 
particularly present everywhere—the habit of wor- 
ship. “On leaving America and Europe and push- 
ing his way into Asia and Africa he would gradually 
say farewell to steam and electricity; the sailboat 
and the canoe would take the place of the steamship, 
the horse and the camel would be substituted for 
the express-train, and the bushman’s hut and the 
hollow tree would replace the skyscraper and the 
palace; languages and dress, habits of mind and 
grades of intelligence and of morality would change 
with a latitude and longitude, but go where he 
might, in Polynesia no less than in Rome and in 
New York, he would everywhere be confronted with 
the same firm belief in some kind of superhuman 
Being whom one must worship, supplicate and 
adore.” We must also note that if man were to 
investigate this habit by means of ancient records, 
he would find that the same phenomenon existed 
everywhere in the past. 

One is often asked why man makes or conceives 
a God. One may as well ask why man carries on 
his business or makes his meal; why he makes his 


18 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


language, his laws, his arts, his sciences, and his 
morality; why he leaves the simple life and enters 
upon the strife of modern civilization. ‘There is 
but one reply which is the ultimate motive in each 
case. It is man’s inherent passion for life and his 
desire that he might have it more abundantly. “The 
Alpha and Omega of religion is life.’ Its mythology 
is devoted to its elucidation and its ritual was called 
into being for its safeguarding. The universality of 
religion is thus due to the universal passion for life. 

As life becomes richer and deeper this craving for 
life, for continuance and expansion, becomes deeper 
and richer. Sir James G. Fraser, after surveying 
the beliefs of the lower races, assures us “that it is 
impossible not to be struck by the strength and, 
perhaps we may say, the universality of the natural 
belief in immortality among the savage races of 
mankind. With them a life after death is not a 
matter of speculation and conjecture, of hope and 
fear; it is a practical certainty which the individual 
as little dreams of doubting as he doubts the reality 
of his conscious existence.” The greatest and most 
universal of all creeds is the one that life must 
continue and that death is but an intruder. Even 
those who on account of some rationalistic reason 
have given up all belief in individual immortality 
have been compelled to devise some kind of sur- 
rogate in race and cosmic immortality. 

The struggle for existence and the passion for 
life exists amongst gods as amongst men, and it is 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 19 


only the fittest that survive. In fact, the very hope 
of man depends upon the war of the gods; for out 
of that war there will emerge one “that cometh 
from Edom with dyed garments from Bozrah, that is 
glorious in his apparel, traveling in the greatness of 
his strength.” In the battle of religions, one reli- 
gion will overcome and silence the others in pro- 
portion as it takes in more of man’s life and does 
more justice to its inherent possibilities. It will 
produce its credentials in placing man in more per- 
manent relations with the center of all Being, called 
God, and it will guarantee its own future by the 
carefulness of its account of the many-sidedness of 
human life. 

This is the reason why the traditional Jew feels 
that his philosophy of life is bound to win in the end, 
for to him Judaism is not a religion in the Western 
sense of the term, but an eternal going-out in search 
for completeness and wholesness of life. Huis search 
for God is, to quote the Hebrew expression, the 
search for the “fountain of life,” and it has come into 
existence as a means of satisfying his insatiable 
hunger for life. So long as we purge ourselves of the 
Philistinism which describes our God as “God of the 
hills but not of the valleys” and believe whole- 
heartedly in the entire spirituality of the universe, 
the earth must belong to religion and particularly to 
that religion which is most satisfying as a system of 
life. Hers also must be the kingdom, the power, 
and the glory. So much for Agnosticism. 


20 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


So many Jews are turning away nowadays from 
Judaism to Ethical Culture, and other systems of 
social philosophy which attempt to construct an 
ethic which shall be independent of theology, that 
one feels compelled to spend a few moments in dis- 
cussing the relationship of religion to morality. In 
Judaism the worship of God has always been indis- 
solubly bound up with its ethical teachings. In 
Christianity, faith was the original element, whilst 
its ethical teachings developed later. 

The traditional Jew cannot countenance the 
religiosity which disregards morality nor the moral- 
ity which seeks to organize life on a non-super- 
natural basis. The modern mind often attempts to 
solve the problem of the relationship between reli- 
gion and morality by regarding them as one. Here 
is the source of its error. They are two things and 
not one, although they are both part of the human 
consciousness springing from one source. Can we 
point to any nation which has lived on ethics with- 
out a religion? The example one hears referred to 
constantly is that of the Chinese, but this is entirely 
untrue; for although Confucius may have been a 
moralist rather than a theologian, he certainly did 
not ignore theology altogether. As a matter of fact, 
we read how on one occasion, in expressing admira- 
tion for an inscription on a certain statue, he says: 
“When you speak, when you act, when you think, 
you seem alone, unseen, unheard; but the spirits are 
witnesses of all.’ The reason why Buddhism and 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 21 


Christianity have been receiving such warm sym- 
pathy in China can only be explained by the fact 
that the Chinese mind has always found a vacant 
place within itself to be filled up from without and 
the Confucian is always more than a Confucian. 
This in itself is sufficient evidence that a system of 
morality organized on a non-supernatural basis 
cannot establish for itself a hold on the masses of 
the people for any length of time. 

We now proceed to discuss the relationship of the 
two entities—religion and morality—and we ask 
whether religion created morality or morality created 
religion. It is true that “as a man so is his God” 
and that the character of a people’s deity depends 
upon their own morality. Also, when a race 
advances from the stage of brutality and savagery 
to that of benevolence and service, its conception of 
its deity advances similarly. This has suggested to 
many that religion is the product of morality. Is 
this really so? How does this advance take place? 
How do people get the “moral advance” that lifts 
them into the spirit of love and service? What is 
the driving power behind our morality that forces 
it upward from one level to another? Looking at 
the problem from a purely scientific standpoint, we 
recognize here at once something different from 
and deeper than the rules and observances which 
form an ethic. In other words, we meet with a 
set of facts in human nature which we call religious. 
In its leaders particularly history is full of examples 


22 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


of men who have suddenly been overcome by some 
sudden vision, trance or spiritual force, and leaving 
the commonplace lives which they had led hitherto, 
went out amongst their fellowmen to preach a new 
doctrine of morality and salvation. The force often 
appears as a vast emotional movement, an uprush 
of mysterious powers which work upon man’s con- 
sciousness with a new overwhelming potency. 

The great prophets of Israel and the stories of 
their conversion supply us with sufficient illustra- 
tions of the force of divinity working upon the 
human emotions. True, this is not morality or 
ethics in the ordinary definitions of the term, but it 
certainly reacts on ethics, for it becomes its main 
driving force. The men who are subject to these 
experiences are immediately placed on an ethical 
crusade. They become scrutinizers of conduct and 
preachers and teachers of the true standards of the 
conduct of others. 

Morality certainly depends upon other sources 
than religion for its evolution. The economic fac- 
tors of life, the growth of education, the opening of 
new communications and means of intercourse 
between nations, and the change from migratory to 
settled and sedentary habits are but a few of the 
active agents which are bringing about a change in 
the moral status of humanity. 

We thus realize that we are not a mere congeries 
of curious specimens of the world’s contents. We 
are moved within by a divine impulse; all things 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 23 


with creative energy are brought into movement by 
us; and this energy is filled with passionate pur- 
pose. The world of society must move ever onward, 
because we passionately will that it shall do so. We 
do not merely grow; we are determined to create. 
God so wills it. 

We have seen, therefore, that moral inspiration 
is unconscious religion, and that religion is one part 
of the human consciousness and morality another— 
both emanating from one source, forming parts of 
the world order; expressions of one will, factors 
working to one and the same end. Here lies the 
connection between morality and theology. Each, 
when healthy, is filled with the other; each plays 
into and then corrects the other. The highest the- 
ology is a product of the highest morality, for both 
form part of the great divine revelation which is 
working alike in every part of the human soul, 
indoctrinating it through feeling and eae fact 
into life’s central mysteries. 

The term “rationalism” has been used in so many 
different senses that it is exceedingly difficult to 
define it. By some it has been regarded as a foe 
to all religion, as an attempt to repudiate the essen- 
tial basic doctrines of Judaism and Christianity, and 
to deny the reality of all revelation. But whilst 
there have been some rationalists who in the name 
of what they call “reason” attempted to show the 
absurdity of all religious faith and belief, there 
have been others whose rationalism was an attempt 


24 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


to minister to faith by their insistence that the 
utterances of religion shall harmonize with the 
canons of thought. 

Now the term “rationalist” was first used in the 
middle of the seventeenth century and applied to 
certain Christian sects. One may note particularly 
the two great parallel movements of thought that 
held the attention of Europe for the greater part of 
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. One was 
inaugurated in England by Bacon and Locke and 
culminated in the scepticism of Hume on the one 
hand and the philosophic faith of Butler on the 
other. The other movement was inaugurated on the 
continent by Descartes. Bacon and Locke attempted 
to discover the relations of God, man, and nature 
primarily by one great method—by allowing exter- 
nal nature to speak to the human mind through her 
facts, independently of all philosophical presupposi- 
tions or personal preferences. Religion, they argued, 
is independent of any special revelation. The only 
true revelation is that of nature which proclaims the 
greatness of her Creator. In the words of Addison: 


The spacious firmament on high 

With all the blue ethereal sky 

And Spangled heavens, a shining frame, 
Their great Original proclaim. 


In reasoned ear they all rejoice 
And utter forth a glorious voice; 
Forever singing as they shine, 

“The hand that made us is Divine.” 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 25 


Locke tells us that the mind depends for its ideas 
of God upon the impressions which the external 
world makes upon our senses. He does not believe 
in “innate ideas of God or miraculous revelations of 
the Deity which are not subject to proof.’ Bacon 
and Locke soon won for themselves a large following 
amongst the religious thinkers of the day. 

A parallel movement on the continent began with 
Descartes. He posited God as the ultimate and only 
real cause or substance. From this substance flow 
the secondary substances of mind and body, of 
thought and matter, whose phenomena correspond 
to each other. Spinoza carried Descartes’ position 
farther and by the same necessity of thought pred- 
icated the one self-existent substance, which is God. 
Finite things are only temporary modes of the divine 
self-expression and so the whole world is the expres- 
sion of the divine perfection. 

Now, before we proceed to consider the claims of 
rationalism, let us remember that whilst all men 
claim to be rational, there are, as Carlyle has pointed 
out, comparatively few who can make good that 
claim. To be rational is to be possessed of the 
power of orderly, consistent thinking, but we must 
remember that in addition to this power there are 
other forms of experience, such as feeling and voli- 
tion, which are almost independent of thought. A 
rationalist, in general, is one who, whilst recognizing 
the place for the play of feeling and of will in our 
nature, seeks to subordinate both to the will of 


26 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


thought. He tells us that he stands for the suprem- 
acy of intellect in man and that he denies what 
reason cannot comprehend and accept. 

The rationalist will only accept those terms which 
his reason can understand and he tells us that he 
only uses terms which are quite comprehensible. 
His favorite saying is “a man must say what he 
means and mean what he says.” Let us now 
examine this premise. The first clause is an intel- 
lectual demand, and the assumption is that any 
intelligent man can meet it without hesitation. 
Macaulay once boasted that he had never written 
a sentence which could be misunderstood by an 
intelligent man; but how many of us can make such 
a boast? We are trying to say what we mean but 
we do not always succeed. In dealing with simple 
matters where there is no doubt as to the term used 
there is little difficulty. For example, to say in 
mathematics that three plus three equals six is to 
say exactly what one means, because the speaker 
knows that the words he uses will convey exactly 
the same meaning to the hearer as is in his own 
mind. The same applies to a legal document where 
the two parties to a contract are agreed upon the 
meanings of the terms used and the obligations 
arising from the agreement. But in dealing with 
universals there is no such agreement. God, Beauty, 
Truth are concepts which cannot be defined; first, 
because words are incapable of expressing the deep 
things of the spirit, and secondly because it is 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 27 


impossible to know how the words spoken by one 
man will be interpreted by another. 

The difficulty in stating plainly what one means 
is often due to the hearer as well as the speaker. 
The hearer may have a very simple idea of an 
exceedingly complex question, and any attempt on 
the part of the speaker to make plain what he under- 
stands may seem to the hearer either unintelligible 
or disingenuous. 

Rationalism has undoubtedly numerous merits. 
It insists that the truly moral life is natural to 
man, that the universe is a unit—this world and 
the next, earth and heaven, are inseparable and are 
governed by the same law. But rationalism, whilst 
accurate in aim, is cold and forbidding to the 
tempted and tried. It may be free from fanaticism 
and hallucinations, but it lacks inspiration and the 
spirit of religious enterprise. 

Our great danger in this age is that of being 
satisfied with a mere intellectual interest, in being 
critical rather than creative, In moving round the 
center at the distance of the circumference. In fact, 
the tendency nowadays is for men to realize more 
and more their need of inspiration and their depend- 
ence upon something higher and wiser than them- 
selves; and rationalism, basing its interpretation of 
religion on assumptions derived from speculation 
rather than from tradition, cannot arouse deep emo- 
tion or enthusiasm in the masses. Rationalism can 
thus only satisfy the intellectual curiosity of the 


28 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


few. It is ultimately aristocratic and can never 
satisfy humanity at large. 

We are all aware of the overwhelming influence 
which the doctrines of socialism have been exerting 
upon the Jewish masses within recent years and the 
extent to which the belief in social reform is 
largely supplanting religious enthusiasm and ardor. 
Whether it is the socialist who has divorced himself 
entirely from all aspects of Jewish life or whether it 
is the Poalei Zionist who is interested only in build- 
ing up a new type of social system in Palestine, we 
must admit that the social appeal has very largely 
replaced the religious enthusiasm which character- 
ized former generations. We are told that it is 
simply a waste of time to discuss the abstruse prob- 
lems of theology or to force the claims of worship 
amidst the unjust and demoralizing conditions by 
which we are surrounded. 

Unfortunately the common means of approach 
to this problem hitherto has been one of hostility on 
the part of many traditional Jews. The symptoms 
of social unrest and of an attempt to supplant faith 
by social reform have been regarded as the very 
opposite of religion. Let us now approach these 
arguments with some measure of understanding and 
sympathy and perhaps we may succeed in finding 
here certain religious elements in the main tenden- 
cies of the modern mind of which their professors 
are themselves unconscious—tendencies which are 
by no means unJewish but which unfortunately 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 29 


declare an illegitimate halt along a road, which, if 
followed further, would lead to Judaism in its highest 
and finest sense. 

In order to get at the root sources of the evils of 
our present economic system, let us commence by 
considering how the individualism and capitalism 
which characterize modern life arose. Individ- 
ualism began to obtain in Northern Europe in the 
sixteenth century and reached its zenith in the realm 
of commerce about the year 1800. People began to 
realize that, if they could sell articles which were 
both good and cheap, it would “pay” them to do 
so, for they would succeed in selling more of them. 
It was advantageous, therefore, to obtain labor as 
cheaply as possible and to have goods manufactured 
at the very cheapest rate, so that the cheaper the 
cost of production, the lower would be the price of 
the article. In other words, man’s selfishness would 
benefit himself as well as society. This, of course, 
added to its evils in encouraging competition, par- 
ticularly in the industrial world between different 
manufacturers. The evils of this system need not 
even be touched upon here; we are all well cognizant 
of them. 

Now, later, a new kind of attempt was put for- 
ward to solve the problem. It was argued that men 
ought not to compete. Is it not possible for them 
to enrich themselves by some other method? And 
so the era of competition began to give way to a 
new era, that of “trusts.” Of course the competitive 


30 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


system and the trust system are based upon one 
principle—how is man to amass most wealth? It is 
not a question of the best method of serving society. 
It is merely selfishness—the best method of acquir- 
ing wealth. Here lies its fallacy. Whether there is 
a combine of the masters of a certain trade to exploit 
their workmen, or of the workmen of that trade to 
raise unnecessarily the price of labor, or a combina- 
tion of employers and employed to raise prices 
against the consumer, the problems of capital and 
labor will never be solved unless each party 
approaches them in a deeply religious spirit, in a 
spirit of meekness and with a readiness to subordi- 
nate its own selfish interests to the interests of 
society as a whole. 

We cannot enter here into a discussion of the 
advantages and disadvantages of the main economic 
doctrines which are being propagated at present— 
Capitalism, Communism, Socialism, and Syndical- 
ism. There are numerous arguments which can be 
placed in favor of and against each of them. Many 
seem to think that it is yet too early to judge the 
results of Communism as following on the Russian 
Revolution, for although it may have been extreme, 
future events may teach us that on the whole it was 
to the advantage of mankind, just as the French 
Revolution was beneficial to humanity in spite of 
its terrible excesses, and that before we can pass 
judgment on the advantages and disadvantages of 
Communism we must wait for further developments. 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 31 


But whether we agree with this view or not we 
must constantly bear in mind that no form of social 
system can succeed unless it is characterized by a 
distinctly religious spirit. Our Jewish workingmen 
have every right to work for that particular system 
of society which they think would be most advan- 
tageous toward bringing about the Kingdom of God 
on earth. But they must realize that, whether it is 
one system of society or another, it cannot and will 
not succeed until men are imbued with a feeling of 
altruism in their dealings with each other. 

The Syndicalism advocated today reminds one in 
many respects of the medieval trade guilds which 
perished through the selfishness by which they were 
characterized—their interest only in the ‘“‘insider.” 
Similarly, the socialistic state presents numerous 
difficulties. How will the state enforce a universal 
service! The finest work is always the work done 
willingly. An unwilling man can never become a 
true poet, artist, or teacher. Very few people are 
willing to do the work which has been selected for 
them by others, and it is generally agreed that real 
success 1n one’s work can only be attained when the 
individual is full of enthusiasm for his task. If the 
doctrines of Socialism as a means of the reorganiza- 
tion of society are to be successful, they must be 
imbued with deep spirituality, with feeling on the 
part of each individual that as a member of society 
he must sacrifice his own interests to the common 
weal, 


32 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Traditional Judaism, therefore, cannot be and is 
not hostile to any of the modern schemes propagated 
by our social thinkers, in so far as these are meant 
for the amelioration of the social conditions of man- 
kind. Furthermore, we must bear in mind that our 
rebellion against modern social conditions, and our 
realization of something entirely different in a 
society utterly unjust and corrupt, is in itself a case 
of supernatural inspiration, and evidence of the 
connection between ourselves and the Infinite. The 
Jewish socialist must come to realize that so far 
from interest in social reform being antagonistic to 
religion, the crude necessities of economics are a 
final guarantee that, no matter how our present sys- 
tem may be modified, belief in ideals, in religious 
inspiration, and in the brotherhood of man are doc- 
trines which cannot be dispensed with, for class war 
and direct action certainly will not bring the com- 
munistic state from heaven. 

The true social reformer realizes that the root of 
our present-day social problems is not so much 
defective social arrangement as sin. If men “knew 
God” and their lives were rooted in religion, then 
every relationship of man to man would be con- 
trolled by moral considerations, and social problems, 
whilst they would not altogether disappear, would 
certainly lose their tragedy and keenness. 

Whilst we realize, therefore, the gravity of the 
problem of capital and labor, and the necessity for 
its immediate solution, to us the paramount social 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM — 33 


problem is everywhere the relation of God to man 
and of man to God. The man who loves God with 
all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might 
will, of course, go on to love his neighbor as himself, 
and inspired with these two motives he, with other 
like-minded men, will be on the true road to the 
solution of all the social problems that confront 
him. 

The more we realize the need for a modification 
of the present system of society, whether it be along 
the lines of one form of economic system or another, 
the more do we realize the necessity for a return to a 
belief in God and the doctrines of brotherhood, 
cooperation, and social justice as taught by the great 
prophets of Israel. In other words, Communism, 
Socialism, and Syndicalism are in themselves reli- 
gious in so far as they are propagated as means of 
ameliorating the social conditions of mankind. But 
their true success can only be brought about by a 
close codperation between them and the elevating 
principles of Judaism. 

Judaism does not present us with an easy and 
simple solution of the problems of individual or 
social life, as suggested by so many writers. Its 
function is rather to create an atmosphere, to set 
all human problems in the light of God’s counten- 
ance, and to make man realize that it is only by a 
mind of faith and freedom, unselfishness and humil- 
ity, that some of the great problems of mankind can 
be solved. 


34 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


The recurring references in the Jewish liturgy to 
the love of God are sufficient evidence of the impor- 
tance which love takes in Judaism. ‘With abound- 
ing love hast thou loved us, O Lord, our God” is the 
commencement of one of the prayers of the morning 
service; and again in the evening service one of the 
prayers commences with the words, ‘‘With everlast- 
ing love hast thou loved Thy people, Israel.’ The 
author of the Song of Songs, writing of love, says, 
“Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the 
floods drown it; if a man would give all the substance 
of his house for love, he would be utterly con- 
temned.” We are told also that the strong man is 
the one who can turn an enemy into a friend, and 
last, but not least, one recalls the biblical command, 
“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” Now, to 
lead a life of love means to lead a life of selfishness, 
a life in which one realizes that one is a vital mem- 
ber of a community and as such must share in its 
activities, ready to sacrifice one’s own interest for 
the sake of the common good. 

From the idea of love we proceed to that of jus- 
tice, for love is the very basis of the Jewish concep- 
tion of justice. Is there any literature where the 
idea of justice is more greatly emphasized than in 
the Bible? “Justice, justice, shalt thou pursue” is 
the cry of the Mosaic code. “Establish justice in 
the gate” and “Let justice roll down as water and 
righteousness as a perpetual stream” are the two 
exhortations of the great prophet Amos. 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 35 


A distinguished American judge, referring to the 
Jewish contributions to civilization, says: 


Israel’s idea of justice has taken permanent 
possession of the human mind. Torn asunder 
by faction, driven from his country, scattered to 
the four winds of heaven, scourged up and down 
the highways of the world, stretched upon the 
rack, burned at the stake, massacred by the 
hundred thousand, a wanderer, friendless and 
homeless through the centuries, despised by the 
world he was liberating from its idols, Israel has 
stamped his ideal of justice on the human con- 
sciousness itself, and lives in every upward 
movement of the race. I do not forget what 
other races have contributed to the common 
store—Athens and Italy their sense of beauty, 
Sparta and Rome their love of discipline and 
order, Gaul and Germany their zeal for liberty, 
England and America their ever-blessed union 
of liberty under law. I do not forget what your 
gifted race has wrought in other ways—in war 
and statecraft, in music, art, poetry, science, 
history, philosophy—but, compared with the 
meaning and majesty of this achievement every 
other work you have accomplished, every other 
triumph of every other people, sinks into insig- 
nificance. Give up every other claim to the 
world’s gratitude before you surrender this: the 
world owes its conception of justice to the Jew. 


The ideal of the great prophets of Israel might 
be summed up in one word—brotherhood. As chil- 


36 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


dren of one God, the people are brothers one of 
another. The bearing of this simple fact, theoreti- 
cally admitted by all, is manifold. For example, men 
who are brethren will not exploit one another—cer- 
tainly not by foul means, but not even by means 
that are legally fair. And all kinds of fraudulent 
practice and commercial dishonesty must therefore 
disappear. If this fact were borne in mind the per- 
son, the property, the honor of every citizen, without 
regard to his social position, would be respected, and 
slavery, cruelty and calumny would die a speedy 
death. The prophetic ideal is that of a society of 
brothers, living at peace in a fruitful land in com- 
fort and security, dealing with each other in a spirit 
of love, and serving their God with humility through 
the faithful discharge of their social obligations. 
Judaism thus teaches that if society is to be made 
better, the men who compose it must be made better. 
Fundamental improvement can be effected ethically 
not by a change in environment but by a change in 
man. It is true that the prophets were the great 
champions of the poor and that the Bible is the 
greatest democratic book in the world. But we must 
remember that the prophets did not merely side with 
the poor against the rich, but with right against 
wrong. It was moral distinctions, not class distinc- 
tions, that mattered to them. We may regard them 
as great reformers if we wish, but it was the men and 
not the situation that they sought to reform. “The 
reformed men could be trusted to reform the situa- 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 37 


tion and men were reformed in God—by returning 
to Him.” 

The world has been constantly trying to escape 
from the doctrines of righteousness and justice as 
taught by the great prophets of Israel, but without 
success. Nietzsche and his school tried to show the 
way “beyond good and evil,” but as a result of this 
moral madness ten million lamps of life were over- 
turned and extinguished. And now asa result of the 
Great War and the numerous upheavals throughout 
the world, mankind is again in a mood to listen to 
the great prophets whose moral idea is God in 
history. To quote the words of James Darmesteter: 


In turning towards these prophets Humanity 
is not retrograding twenty-six centuries; it is 
they who are twenty-six centuries in advance. 
The spirit of the prophets is in the modern soul. 
Righteousness was to them an active force; the 
idea was converted into a fact before which all 
other facts paled. The utterances of these old 
prophets, though most ancient, remain young, 
and the new age has not found either among its 
philosophers, its moralists, or its poets, words 
with a magic equal to theirs; in their speech is 
concentrated all the greatness of conscience and 
the ideal. They spread over the future, above 
the storms of the present, the rainbow of a vast 
hope—a radiant vision of a better humanity. 


Let us now conclude this chapter with a few 
thoughts on the so-called conflict of science and 


388 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


religion. It has recently been claimed that science 
has gradually been driving out religion from her 
strongholds, and the assertion 1s even made that 
the material and moral world can be explained by 
the concepts of physics and chemistry. We are told 
that Judaism can no longer be accepted by the mod- 
ern man, for “the Copernican astronomy has 
destroyed the view of the cosmos as outlined in the 
Bible; geology has disproved its cosmogony and 
view of the age of the earth; and anthropology has 
similarly confuted its teaching on the age of man.” 
Science and advancing knowledge, we are constantly 
informed, have given the death-blow to Judaism, 
and we must either accept one or the other, recon- 
ciliation between them being beyond the bounds of 
possibility. 

We shall deal further in the course of this work 
with the supposed conflict between the Bible and 
modern science, but let us remember that the 
so-called conflict between science and religion is not 
a conflict between the whole region of science nor 
the whole region of religion, but a conflict on the 
inevitable border-line, a border between the sea of 
science and the land of religion, from which only 
the crumbling shores and a few weakly constructed 
embankments and jetties of religion have been swept 
away. ‘The sea remains sea, and the land solid land. 

We must bear in mind that the pretended knowl- 
edge of many of these so-called “men of science” is 
ignorance and nothing more. Science tells us the 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 39 


physical attributes of certain things, but it cannot 
describe to us the secret of their existence. In the 
words of one of Balzac’s characters, “The scientist 
may analyze for us a tear and describe it as being 
composed of gum and water. But is that all that a 
tear consists of? What about the pain and pity 
by which these physical ingredients are transformed 
and the tear becomes what it is?” Science may tell 
us of God in the material world, but the real witness 
to Him is the soul’s experience in the spiritual 
sphere. 

There is no need for us to suspend our reasoning 
powers or to ignore the conclusions of modern 
scientific thinkers in order to believe in a supreme 
being. Nor is there any need for a man to be a 
sceptic in order to have the hallmark of culture. 
We have learned that even science is no longer 
omniscient. No one recognizes more clearly than 
the true scientists how little of the universe is 
known. And they admit themselves the existence of 
a realm of knowledge which they are powerless to 
penetrate, a vast world of being which their methods 
cannot explore and a force behind nature which 
becomes more mysterious and enigmatic the deeper 
we penetrate into the knowledge of its attributes. 

As a matter of fact, the trend at present is all 
toward a spiritualistic interpretation of nature. 
Science has not destroyed any of the great funda- 
mental ideas of Judaism. The barriers between the 
spiritual and the material, the vital and the non- 


40 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


vital, still remain, and science rather than destroying 
tends to confirm the fundamental ideas of our belief 
—God, the soul, the future life. The leading scien- 
tists of the day do not accept the mechanical or 
chemical explanations of life. Every advance in 
knowledge enables us to draw a deeper distinction 
between the spiritual mind and the material brain, 
between our soul and the corporeal organism which 
meanwhile it inhabits. 

We must also bear in mind that the varying 
explanations of science are not necessarily truer but | 
only simpler. As progress continues and knowledge 
develops, the accepted scientific theories are replaced 
by newer ones. We are gradually beginning to 
realize that science can describe nature but cannot 
explain it. For example, there was a time when it 
was believed by the scientific men of the day that 
the heavenly bodies rolled in great curves of which 
the earth was the center. That was the view of 
Ptolemy, who was a great scientist in his time, and 
was accepted by many scientists who succeeded him. 
This view has now been superseded by that of Coper- 
nicus and Galileo, who regard the sun as the center 
of the heavens and the earth and planets as moving 
round it. We may now say that to our minds the 
heliocentric theory of Copernicus is simpler than the 
geocentric theory of Ptolemy, but we have no defi- 
nite proof that it is truer. There is nothing final in 
the field of experimental science, and even those 
“mathematical truths’ which were regarded form- 


MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR JUDAISM 41 


erly by many scientists as ultimate and final are now 
regarded by many mathematicians as mere “working 
hypotheses.” 

We have been taught within recent years that the 
earth is but an ordinary satellite of a planet which is 
itself only a star among numberless stars, a mere 
vanishing point in the illimitable All. But as we 
realize the smallness of the earth on which we live, 
do we not also realize the vastness of the universe 
of which it forms a part and the greatness of the 
power which brought it into being? Do we not 
realize that behind all phenomena of life there is a 
power, an energy, an infinite from which matter and 
mind proceed, and which is not lower but higher 
than personality? 

Recently Haeckel set out to form a new kind of 
religion by his semi-materialistic theories of 
Monism. No outstanding scientist of any school 
of thought accepts these theories today, and even 
many of Haeckel’s chief authorities, including 
scholars of such distinction as Wundt, Romanes, 
Virchow, Du Bois Reymond, deserted him later and 
not only accepted but actually became themselves 
staunch advocates of a spiritual interpretation of the 
universe. In the second edition of his book, Human 
and Animal Psychology, Wundt tells us quite frankly 
that the theories of Haeckel which he had advocated 
in the first edition “weighed on him as a kind of 
crime from which he longed to free himself as soon 
as possible.” 


42 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Theologians have very foolishly at times attacked 
the accepted views of leading scientific thinkers, but 
scientists have also at times, if not even more often, 
attacked the views of leading theologians. It was 
not only the theologians who looked askance on 
Copernican astronomy or on the theories of evolu- 
tion when these theories were first propounded, but 
also the scientists of the day. The mistakes made 
by theology have also been made by science. We 
must learn once and for all to “render unto Cesar 
the things that are Cesar’s,” unto science the things 
that are science’s, “and unto God the things that 
are God’s.” 


In literature the world has a heritage with which no 
other of its possessions can compare in value, for by 
words, more than by any other form of expression, the 
mind and heart are revealed and the intellectual and 
spiritual treasure of the race preserved. Through books 
we may know the mind of the past and transmit the 
mind of the present. The greatest book is the Bible and 
the reason for the place assigned to it is that it contains 
interpretations of human life, actual and ideal, which 
reveal man to himself, in his joys and sorrows, his tri- 
umphs and his defeats, his aspirations and his possibili- 
ties, his relations to other men, and comprehending and 
enveloping all, his relations to God. The Bible, con- 
cerned as it is in its component parts with the revelation 
of God to man, and the relation of man to God, has 
held the attention of men because it is true to the truths 
of life and satisfying to the yearnings of the human 
spirit. 

PENNIMAN: A Book About the English Bible. 


43 


ty A 
Le 
‘> 


ai 





CHAPTER II 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 


The Bible is the great charter which God gave humanity through 
Israel—Modern tendency to disparage the God of Israel— 
The ethics of the Pentateuch—The “tribal” God of Israel— 
—The Bible as literature—The Bible and the social state— 
The status of womanhood in the Bible—The Bible and kind- 
ness to animals. 


Tue Bible not only holds a unique place in the 
creative literatures of the world’s religions but is one 
of the basic foundations of Judaism. It is the great 
charter which God gave humanity through our race. 
These two sentences summarize the attitude of the 
Jew toward the Bible. We regard the Bible as a 
compendium of the literature of a small people, 
obscure in origin, limited in outlook, but charged 
with a mission and a message for humanity at large 
the significance of which has deepened with the 
lapse of ages and the influence of which is the most 
far-reaching in the whole world. It is the vade 
mecum of pilgrim man on his journey through time 
into eternity, dealing, as it does, with the soul of 
man in relation with the living God. It reveals man 
to himself as a seeker after God and God in His 
method of inspiring and educating man. It is a col- 
lection of books consisting of a wonderful variety of 

45 


46 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


literature—poetry and drama, idyll and allegory, 
record and prophecy. Its galleries of portraits com- 
prise king and beggar, rich and poor, oppressor and 
slave, dreamer and doer, each unfolding his destiny 
according to his time. Its central figure is God and 
its story is that of His work and greatness. We do 
not go to the Bible to learn science, for science deals 
with secondary causes only, and in the Bible these 
have no place; nor do we go to the Bible to learn 
history in the usually accepted sense of the term, for 
history deals with events in their purely human 
aspects. 

To us the Bible is a record of God’s revealing and 
redeeming activity in human affairs. It is every- 
where in close touch with actual life. It is the 
harvest of seed divinely sown in the minds of men, 
the fruitage of the unique national history, the 
garnered experience of a multitude of saints and 
sinners. Every vital truth which it contains comes 
to us bearing the mark of God’s action in seeking 
man and man’s in seeking God. He is not a God 
far off but a living God who has visited and 
redeemed His people. And just because the record 
of God’s activity—His “marching”—and man’s con- 
sequent “bestirring himself” is so vividly real, it 
has an undying interest for both the man of faith 
and the humanist. 

We to whom the Bible is the word of God have 
no cause to apologise for our attachment to it. 
We see Israel slowly rising from its early gross- 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 47 


ness and its crude conception of God. We observe 
how the Spirit worked like leaven in that uncon- 
genial mass, till it so moralized and spiritualized 
it that it was possible for a great philosopher to say, 
“So far as her religion was concerned, Israel among 
the surrounding peoples seemed like a sober man in 
the company of drunkards.” Set it by the religious 
literatures of other ancient nations and you will 
be struck by its purity, its emotional quality, its 
elevated thought of God, and its combination of a 
lofty religion and an exalted morality. When we 
come to that point of view, we are the better pre- 
pared to estimate the work which was done by the 
ereat outstanding figures in Israel’s history. For 
these were elect spirits, men who had seen God 
face to face, who had felt on their lips the pressure 
of the glowing coal from the altar, or whose spirits 
had been moved as the hand of God grasped them 
and threw them into the prophetic ecstasy; men 
whose inner eye had been unveiled that they might 
penetrate into the secrets of God, and through whose 
chosen spirits there had come a truer and higher 
revelation than had come to the people as a 
whole. } 

Even in the light of modern scientific criticism the 
Bible still remains to us the word of God. It is a 
record of God’s own education of His ancient people. 
We see in it how his spirit struck into the life of 
the nation and how behind and beneath the literary 
documents we possess He was creating the soil 


48 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


in which they were to flower. Scholars in referring 
to the inspiration of the Bible formerly used to 
explain it as meaning that the Spirit enlightened the 
minds of those who were the authors of our biblical 
literature. But we can now go even further than 
that. We can see the whole nation and the national 
history as being in the first instance the object of 
that divine inspiration. 

When we look abroad at the history of the world, 
we may say that the spirit of God is everywhere 
present as atmosphere; there is no place so savage 
and so benighted but where God’s light is seeking to 
do its congenial work. But what is present every- 
where as atmosphere is present in the history of 
Israel as a mighty, rushing wind. We understand 
how, out of the nation’s history which was under the 
direct leadership and guidance of God’s spirit, there 
arose gradually those institutions in which its reli- 
gious instinct found its most congenial expression. 
We see God subduing them to His will, checking 
them here, driving them onward there, now send- 
ing them the sunshine of prosperity, now the drastic 
discipline of suffering, conducting them by varied 
processes till they attained that exceedingly high 
level of religion and morality which has influenced 
humanity. 

If there is to be a revival of interest in Judaism, 
there must be a revival of interest in the Bible. 
And it is only by a clear exposition of its moral, 
ethical, and religious value that we shall succeed in 


wy 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 49 


awakening the slumbering interest in our sacred 
literature. We must realize that not only our 
prophets but the Pentateuch itself attained an 
exceedingly high standard of morality and uni- 
versalism. 

There is a tendency nowadays to regard the Pen- 
tateuch as having lost all its religious values and 
to treat it as being of merely historical significance. 
We are so often told that the Pentateuch is a grue- 
some heritage of the past, an unfortunate book of 
cruelty and law, that it is up to us to examine some 
of these statements. It is up to us to consider 
whether the fashion which has recently come into 
vogue of so thoughtlessly disparaging Israel’s 
invaluable treasure is in any way justifiable. How 
often is 1t repeated that the God of Israel is cruel 
and revengeful, His morality cruel, His teachings 
and His religion without inwardness, and that they 
have been superceded by the teaching of “love” in 
the New Testament. 

In order to appreciate the spirit of Pentateuchal 
ethics, let us take as a typical example the account 
of the destruction of the two towns, Sodom and 
Gemorrah, as narrated in the Bible (Gen. xvii). It 
has become fashionable nowadays for the modern 
critics to regard the account as a myth, the product 
of Israel’s national imagination, and nothing more. 
An analysis of the whole account, however, shows 
how it mirrors the depth of Israel’s religious feeling 
and the greatness of Israel’s morality. God does not 


50 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


select these towns to be destroyed merely for His 
own pleasure. It is because the neighbors ery to 
Him and complain of the inhumanity of the inhabi- 
tants, their arrogance of wealth, and their mocking 
hospitality. In other words, it is the sins of the 
inhabitants of these cities against their fellow men 
which provoke Grd to anger. Man was created in 
the image of God and he who sins against man sins 
against God and is punished by God. But, further- 
more, God is also provoked to anger by their 
immorality. That the creature formed in the image 
of God should sink to the level of a beast was 
simply intolerable to the Hebrew mind. Purity of 
thought and chastity of life must be maintained at 
all costs, and under no circumstances can God 
approve of human bestiality or “modern morality,” 
which glorifies the body at the expense of the soul. 
God therefore selects Abraham and spares him from 
the midst of this destruction so that he and his 
descendants may continue to practice the great 
principles of equity and justice toward their fellow 
men: “I have known him to the end that he may 
command his children and his household after him, 
that they may keep the way of the Lord to do 
righteousness and equity (Gen. xviii, 19). This is 
what the alleged “‘tribal” God of Israel demanded of 
Abraham. In the words of Buchler: 


Just as a small number of righteous men 
should in his [Abraham’s] view of God be suf- 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 51 


ficient to save the lives of all the inhabitants of 
Sodom, so God is considerate, kind and merci- 
ful, ready to spare the life of even the gravest 
sinner. He is not cruel, not indifferent to 
prayer, and accepts the intercession of one that 
approaches Him with far-going requests for the 
preservation of the doomed lives of others. 
God, in His inexhaustible mercy, is satisfied 
with a small number of religious men for grant- 
ing forgiveness to the whole town of sinners; 
and it is a telling proof of His great love for 
His children that He accepts a righteous man 
as a redeemer of the sins of others. But 
Abraham’s prayer teaches us again that the only 
way for a mortal to approach God, and the only 
right attitude befitting man towards the eter- 
nal God, is humility. Not in pride at his 
higher morality did Abraham claim special con- 
sideration, nor was he pointing to the merit of 
his practice of righteousness and equity, nor 
to his love of peace, nor to the repeated help 
given by him to the weak and helpless, nor did 
he remind God that he was His favorite and the 
only representative of the true God. He 
referred to none of those undisputed merits, but 
he supported his daring intercession for the 
sinners by the declaration that he is merely 
dust and ashes, and still dare plead for others. 
Such humility was an example for many an 
Israelite, and it was at all times the attitude of 
our great men; and such lowliness descended 
from them to the spiritual leaders of the 


52 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Pharisees, among them to Hillel, the meek and 
humble, and they formed the counterpart of 
the unlovely Pharisee painted in the New 
Testament. Meekness in the association with 
fellow men and humility before God consti- 
tuted the character of Abraham and of Moses, 
and those qualities inspired genuine inwardness 
of religion and the unselfish love of mankind. 
This wealth of moral and religious thought and 
action in Abraham’s intercession is more than 
sufficient to prove the deliberate disparage- 
ment of the religion and the morality of the 
Pentateuch as being without foundation; and 
at the same time it urges every Jew of intellect 
to turn to the Torah as the true guide on the 
way of permanent morality and religion. 


These ancient records that embody for us the 
basis of our religion are venerable and interesting 
from every point of view. It is true that their most 
important aspect is that from which they are con- 
sidered as the symbols and assurances of divine 
truth. But in order to realize, however, the greatness 
of the Bible, we will set aside for the moment the 
traditional view which has always regarded it as an 
isolated literature and we will consider it purely as 
a human work recording the institutions of an 
ancient Oriental race. We shall then be able to 
realize that, even when treated purely as human 
literature, it contains an unsurpassed greatness. 

Let us consider it from the following points of 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 53 


view: (1) Its literary merits; (2) its attitude toward 
the oppressed, the poor, and the stranger in the 
social state; (3) its attitude toward womanhood; 
(4) its attitude toward the animal kingdom. 


Tue Brste as LITERATURE 


Israel, like all other ancient races, gave expres- 
sion to its sentiments by music and dancing. There 
are frequent references to this in the Bible, and post- 
biblical Hebrew writers assumed that it was prac- 
ticed by the patriarchs. The Israelites knew of such 
instruments as the lyre, the harp, the pipe, the 
timbrel and tabret, cymbals and castanets. Jubal, 
“the father of all such as handled the harp and 
pipe,’ is one of the forefathers of all mankind. 
Every occasion of ceremony and rejoicing had its 
appropriate accompaniment of music. One imme- 
diately recalls Laban’s reproach to Jacob, saying, 
“Why didst thou flee secretly and steal away from 
me; and didst not tell me that I might have sent 
thee away with mirth and with songs, with tabret 
and with harp?” In the time of David, when the 
ark was brought up to Jerusalem, it was accom- 
panied with all kinds of music. To enhance the 
pleasure at the king’s table there was a company of 
singing men and women. But instrumental music 
was primarily used for the accompaniment of the 
song and dance. We can imagine Miriam standing 
in the center of a chorus and intoning, “Sing ye to 
God for He hath triumphed gloriously,” and the 


54 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


maidens by whom she is surrounded moving with 
rhythmic steps to the sound of tambourines, and 
replying, “Horse and his rider hath He thrown into 
the sea.” 

It was out of this rhythmic expression, which con- 
sisted of measured words accompanied by dancing, 
that Israelitish literature first originated. As their 
skill in the manipulation of words increased, nar- 
rative overflowed into the wider and more beautiful 
forms of prose, and song gave way to recitation. 
Literature is the expression of life and it can only 
be understood if it is viewed as the outcome of 
collective and individual experience. In the words 
of Professor Hudson: 


The literature of a people is not merely a 
miscellaneous collection of books which happen 
to have been written in the same tongue or 
within a given geographical area. It is the pro- 
gressive revelation, age by age, of such nation’s 
mind and character. An individual writer may 
vary very greatly from the national type... 
but his genius will still partake of the char- 
acteristic spirit of his race, and in any number 
of representative writers at any time that 
spirit will be felt as a well-defined quality per- 
vading them all. By this we do not, of course, 
suggest that all Greeks thought and felt in the 
same way, that all Hebrews thought and felt 
in the same way. We simply mean that, when 
all differences as between man and man have 


4 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 59 


been cancelled, there remains in each case a 
clearly recognized substratum of racial char- 
acter, a certain broad element common to all 
Greeks as Greeks and to all Hebrews as 
Hebrews. 


It is an advantage to contrast the complexity of 
English or American literature with the simplicity 
which characterizes the narratives of the Hebrews. 
Tolstoi, in his work What is Art? emphasizes this 
viewpoint and points out that our tastes are becom- 
ing more and more sophisticated and we seem to 
be losing all appreciation of simplicity. He takes 
the story of Joseph as narrated in the Bible to illus- 
trate his meaning, and points out how, in modern 
fiction, the reader has to disengage the human ele- 
ments from the mass of non-essential accretions 
with which they are burdened. The simple Bible 
narratives, however, are not encumbered by masses 
of detail—analysis, description, comment—which 
according to him are the means of destroying instead 
of helping the effects of modern narratives. In an 
interesting passage of one of his works he says: 


I do not know a book which gives in such 
compact and poetic form every phase of human 
ideas as the Bible. All the questions which 
arise out of the manifestations of nature have 
their answers here; all the original relations of 
man to man, the family, the state and religion 
are known for the first time through this book. 
The power of truth and wisdom in its simple, 


56 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


childish form, takes hold of the child’s mind 
with its powerful charm. The Psalms of David 
influence not only the thought of the child, 
but he learns to know for the first time the 
whole fascination of poetry and its inimitable 
form—purity and strength. Who of us has not 
wept over the story of Joseph and his brethern, 
or listened to the story of the shorn Samson 
with much anxiety and beating of the heart; 
and who has not received all those other hun- 
dreds of noble impressions which we have 
drawn in as with our mother’s milk? I repeat 
it, without the Bible, the education of the child 
in the present state of society is impossible. 


We are not all prepared to agree with Tolstoi 
that modern art is all wrong and that ancient art 
is all right. But we must admit the advantages of 
the older art as a means of keeping our tastes 
inspired, and for this course the literature of the 
Bible provides ample material. 

We think of some of the characters’ of the Bible 
entirely apart from their religious significance and 
the interest they have for us as mere literary char- 
acters and nothing more—the grave majesty of 
Abraham, the unsullied purity and high political 
talent of Joseph, Moses the lawgiver and leader of 
his people, the graceful piety of the infant Samuel, 
the wild and frenzied heroism of Saul, the various 
gifts and graces of the unrivaled “monarch- 
minstrel,” and the splendid pageant of his brilliant 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 57 


son and successor. We turn from this throng of 
warriors, priests, and poets and recall the charming 
apparitions of female grace and heroism. ‘The 
beauty of Sarah that subdued all hearts even at the 
brilliant court of Egypt, the touching self-sacrifice 
of the daughter of Jephtah, the poetical enthusiasm 
of Miriam, the masculine valor of Deborah, and the 
far-famed Egyptian bride whose praises are 
embalmed in the Song of Songs. 

Speaking of the Bible purely as literature Huxley 
says: “By the study of what other book could chil- 
dren be so much humanized and made to feel that 
each figure in that vast historical procession fills, 
like themselves, but a momentary space in the 
interval between two eternities, and earns the bless- 
ings and cursings of all time, according to its efforts 
to do good and hate evil even as they also are earn- 
ing their payment for their work?” 

Hebrew literature has been molded in no small 
degree by the Hebrew language, and the language 
of ancient Israel was well adapted to her innate 
temperament. Her vocabulary was vivid and con- 
crete rather than abstract and pale. The Israelites 
at a very early period in their history learned the 
idea of one God and so they fashioned no epic poems 
such as the Babylonians had in the story of 
Gilgamesh. 

There was current in early Israel a considerable 
amount of literature consisting of brief poems, 
popular tales, and narratives. All this was carried 


58 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


on by professional reciters, passing only as oral tra- 
dition, and the art of story-telling was widely cul- 
tivated. Later, oral tales were woven into written 
narratives. In every village group songs were sung 
and narratives related to celebrate heroic deeds or 
to rehearse some heightened incident of which their 
own portion of the countryside was once the scene. 
The writers of later years thus gathered together 
their material from the songs and narratives of 
Israel’s lusty manhood in its tribal days. 

Poetry is the language of the heart and that style 
is most appropriate which speaks directly and unaf- 
fectedly to the heart. The sphere of cold abstraction 
is alien to poetry, for its world is one of warm, full- 
blooded life suffused with glowing imagination and 
rich in figures of speech, metaphors, similes, and 
pictures drawn or suggested. Being inspired by feel- 
ing it must also throb with feeling, and the touch of 
passion is one of the truest tests of the feeling which 
is the very soul of poetry. 

Poetry in all its highest departments of sublimity, 
pathos, and beauty is scattered through the pages 
of the sacred volume with a profusion which we look 
for in vain in any other quarter. We need think 
only of the beautiful pastoral of Ruth, the sublime 
tragedy of Job, the splendid lyrical effusions of the 
earlier and later bards, that are scattered like gems 
over the rich groundwork of the historical and pro- 
phetic books, the treasures of thought concentrated 
in the Proverbs, the impassioned tenderness that 
breathes through the love-songs of Solomon, finally 


pp Site Ot ios yee i Se eS 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 59 


and above all the beautiful and inspiring book of 
Psalms, consisting of a collection of odes unequaled, 
unapproached, one may say—even in mere literary 
merit—in any other language; odes before which 
Pindar and Horace and the modern lyrical poets of 
highest fame hide their diminished heads; odes 
which even in the bald imitation of the modern 
versifiers thrill with delight and exalt with religious 
rapture. 

We think of the lament of David upon the death 
of Saul and Jonathan as an example. There are few 
incidents in the course of human affairs more affect- 
ing than the fall of a young warrior in battle. 
Jonathan and David were very dear friends. For 
Saul, to whom he was indebted in the first instance 
for his political advancement, although he had later 
much reason to complain of the groundless 
jealousy and persecution of the wayward king, 
David had always cherished the sentiments of grati- 
tude and respect which were natural under such 
circumstances to his generous and elevated char- 
acter. The fall of father and son awakens all his 
emotions and he pours them out with a pure taste 
and concentrated power that belongs to his style, 
in perhaps the most touching of all poems 


The beauty of Israel is slain upon the high places 

How are the mighty fallen! 

Tell it not in Gath! 

Publish it not in the streets of Askelon! 

Ye mountains of Gilboa, let there be no rain nor 
dew upon you! 


60 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


In general quality Hebrew poetry exhibits to the 
full the main racial characteristics of the people. It 
is the poetry of a hot-blooded Eastern people who 
gave themselves up entirely to the emotion of the 
moment and poured forth their feelings in songs of 
contrition, supplication, hope, despair, sorrow, 
doubt, faith, devotion, passionate love of God, and 
ferocious hatred of their enemies; hence their fre- 
quent extravagances of expression, as when in his 
excitement the poet describes the “mountains as 
skipping like rams and the hills like the young of a 
flock.” 

We cannot enter here into all the different forms 
of Hebrew meter, but we may refer to the kina 
measure, which is perhaps the most interesting of 
all forms of Hebrew verse. This measure has three 
stresses in the first line and two in the second, and 
is used particularly to express grief and sorrow. 
The Book of Lamentations, as well as other portions 
of the Bible, are written in the kina measure. The 
dirges are not the spontaneous outbursts of natural 
emotions but are rather carefully prepared poems, 
and the prophet used this measure to create a deep 
impression. 


How doth the city sit solitary,—she that was full of 
people! 
She is become as a widow,—she that was great among 
the nations! 
The princess among the provinces,—she is become tribu- 
tary. 
(Lam. i. 1.) 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 61 


He hath hewn off in fierceness of anger—all the horn of 
Israel: 
He hath drawn back His right hand—from before the 
_ enemy, 
And he hath burned up Jacob as a flaming fire,—it 
devoureth round about. 
(Lam. ii. 3.) 


THE BIBLE AND THE SOCIAL STATE 


How to steer the ship of society between the 
Seylla of exorbitant wealth and the Charybdis of 
abject poverty has been one of the great problems 
of social legislation from time immemorial. One of 
the earliest instances of the execution of judgment 
in Israel is the account given of Moses and Jethro. 
Moses sits in judgment on his people and the people 
stand about him from morning till evening. When- 
ever they have a matter to dispute they come to 
him and he judges between a man and his neighbor 
and makes known to them the statutes of God and 
His laws. Jethro protests that Moses cannot carry 
so great a burden alone and he suggests that he 
select from the people God-fearing, truthful men 
and that he appoint them to be rulers of thousands, 
rulers of hundreds, of fifties and tens, to judge the 
people at all seasons. The smaller matters they will 
judge themselves and the more difficult ones they 
will bring to him. 

Moses laid the foundation of Hebrew justice and 
he was at once judge and legislator. All require- 
ments formulated as law were equally of divine 


62 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


inspiration and decree and it was characteristic of 
Israel to identify the commandments of God with 
all law. The Mosaic code of social justice deals in 
the main with the treatment due to slaves; with 
crimes punishable by death such as murder, man- 
stealing, sorcery, smiting a parent; with damage to 
animals or caused by them and with breach or 
negligence of trust. We have laws regarding the 
ownership of land and the practice of farming with 
its attendant lability to damage of cattle and crops. 
Similarly, in the giving of evidence the utmost care 
is to be taken that the witnesses are truthful: 
“Thou shalt not take up a false report; put not thy 
hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness 
... keep thee far from a false matter, and the inno- 
cent and the righteous, slay thou not” (Ex. xxiil. 
Lie); 

As to consideration for the poor, it has rightly 
been said that while the biblical code is true to the 
best that is in us, the philanthropy of the Bible is 
wholesome and vigorous. With inerrant accuracy it 
draws the line invisible to so many modern 
reformers between sentiment and sentimentality. It 
rests not so much on love for the individual as on 
love for the whole human family. The Mosaic legis- 
lation is based on a feeling that poverty could not be 
altogether eradicated. “The poor man will not cease 
from the land” (Deut. xv. 11) reads one passage in 
the Bible, but it is the duty of society to see that 
he is not made to suffer from unscrupulous com- 


as 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 63 


petition and selfishness or social ostracism. The 
Sabbath, the year of release, and the year of Jubilee 
were therefore introduced so that every man would 
have full opportunity for bodily rest and moral 
elevation. The wealthy man must not prove him- 
self a hard master or extortionate creditor. He must 
admit the poor to his hospitality and leave part of 
his own crops for him. A kind of tax for the poor 
was the tithe of the produce of every third year 
(Deut. xiv. 28). For two years the tithe was to be 
used for the family festival, but in the third year 
it was to belong to the Levites, the sojourner, the 
fatherless, and the widow. 

The virtue of charity is everywhere commended. 
The prophets of a later period emphasize that gen- 
erosity to the poor is.more pleasing to God than 
ritual observance, and it is included among the char- 
acteristics of the worthy woman that she stretcheth 
out her hand to the poor (Prov. xxxi. 20). The pro- 
visions concerning loans without interest were in 
reality not economic laws but injunctions to gen- 
erous brotherly assistance to the unfortunate. In 
Deuteronomy the loan scarcely differs from the gift. 
_ It is the opening of the hand to the poor. The well- 
to-do must lend to the poor according to his needs 
and the heart of the lender must not be grieved in 
doing so (Deut. xv. 7-15). In later times when it 
was brought to the attention of Nehemiah that a 
shameful condition existed as a result of debt and 
usury, he passionately called upon the nobles to 


64 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


remit the loans and was successful in his appeal 
(Neh. v. 9-12). | 

The laws dealing with charity in the Mosaic code 
manifest the deepest and most tender spirit of 
humanity. No other nation of ancient times made 
such ample and wise provision for the wants of the 
poor and for the equality and oneness of the rich 
and poor. Let us proceed to consider a few more of 
these laws. 

(1) The extreme part of the harvest fields was 
left unharvested for the poor: “And when ye reap 
the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap 
the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the 
gleaning of thy harvest” (Lev. xix. 9). 

(2) “And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard. 
Neither shalt thou gather the fallen fruit of thy 
vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and 
for the stranger” (Lev. xix. 10). From the Book of 
Ruth we learn that the poor often lived well on 
this gleaning which was left for them. 

(3) A forgotten sheaf must be left in the field for 
the gleaners: “When thou cuttest down thy harvest 
in thy field and hast forgotten a sheaf, thou shalt 
not turn again to fetch it: it shall be for the stranger, 
for the fatherless and for the widow” (Deut. xxiv. 
19). 

(4) The person passing through a vineyard or a 
field had the right to eat of its fruit: “When thou 
comest into thy neighbor’s vineyard, thou mayest 





THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 65 


eat grapes at thine own pleasure, but thou shalt not 
put any in thy vessel” (Deut. xxiii. 24, 25).* 

(5) It was not permissible to keep the pledge of 
the poor overnight: “And if he be a poor man, thou 
shalt not sleep with his pledge: thou shalt deliver 
him the pledge again when the sun goeth down” 
(Deut. xxiv. 12-13). It was a common practice in 
the East to take pledges for the payment of debt, 
and this law was almost equivalent to a prohibition 
of taking a very poor man’s pledge. The essentials 
of life must not be withheld from those needing 
them. 

(6) “No man shall take the nether or upper mill- 
stone to pledge; for he taketh a man’s life to pledge” 
(Deut. xxiv. 6). In the East each one had a small 
handmill upon which he was daily dependent 
to grind meal to fill the mouths of his wife, 
and his little ones and himself. That could not be 
taken for debt; for such “‘taketh a man’s life to 
pledge.” | 

(7) Thou shalt not take the widow’s raiment to 
pledge” (Deut. xxiv. 17). 

(8) The poor were to be assisted by being loaned 
money without interest. No usury is to be taken 
of the poor, for it is very difficult for a poor man to 
pay borrowed money. The interest which is added 
to it is like a crushing burden, a serpent’s bite. It 


1 According to tradition this applied only to a workman in his 
master’s field. 


66 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


cripples him in all his financial interests. “And if 
thy brother be waxen poor and his hand faileth with 
thee, thou shalt then relieve him: yea, though he be 
a stranger and a sojourner (Lev. xxv. 35-36). 

(9) Every Jubilee year, those who lost their lands 
by debt had them returned to them (Lev. xxv. 
25-28). 

(10) The poor were to partake of all the enter- 
tainments at the Feast of Weeks and the Feast of 
Tabernacles; also of the Passover. These feasts 
brought the rich and poor together and helped to 
cultivate a.community of sympathy and interest, 
keeping the people on an equality. It thus helped 
to remove all prejudices between rich and poor. 

(11) Hired servants must not be defrauded of 
their wages. Such was God’s regard for the poor 
that they had to be paid their wages at the close 
of the day (Lev. xix. 13). 

It is of interest to note that the Babylonians and 
Canaanites had codes of social laws similar to the 
Hebrews. Hammurabi, one of the outstanding 
figures of Babylonian history, who reigned about 
2100 B.c.E., promulgated a code of legislation which 
in many respects 1s very similar to the Mosaic code, 
and more than half of the laws of Exodus are closely 
analogous to Hammurabi’s laws, though with vari- 
ations in detail. But the Hebrews, after all, molded 
their laws to suit the Hebraic spirit, and they are 
characterized by a moral earnestness which is lack- 
ing in the Hammurabi code. In ancient times all 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 67 


law was regarded as the direct expression of God’s 
will, whilst civil ordinances and ritual commands 
were based on religion and no distinction was made 
between them. But amongst the Hebrews their 
high conception of God and His moral nature neces- 
sitated that the hard demand of justice should be 
mollified to pity. The stranger, the widow, and the 
fatherless must not be oppressed, and even the ox 
of an enemy that has strayed must be returned. 

As soon as the Hebrews came into private owner- 
ship of land there arose distinctions between rich 
and poor. The corruption of justice and the practice 
of lending money on pledge helped the rich to 
increase their wealth. Cases in dispute were brought 
to the priest at the sanctuary, but as the judges 
now belonged to the aristocracy their judgments 
were often based in favor of their own class. It also 
became customary to bring a present to the judge, 
and this soon came to be a bribe. The commands 
of the law code, “Thou shalt not wrest the justice 
of thy poor in his cause”; and “Thou shalt take no 
gift; for a gift blindeth them that hath sight and 
perverteth the words of the righteous,” were over- 
looked (Ex. xxiii. 6, 8; Deut. xvi. 19). The per- 
version of judgment went along with other forms of 
oppression. The small farmer was taxed most 
heavily, and the poor having no capital to fall back 
on in time of distress were compelled to mortgage 
their land or pledge their personal belongings. In 
default of payment the security was forfeited and 


68 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


the borrower or his children were even sold into 
slavery. The wealthy thus added to their wealth 
and the poor sank deeper and deeper into despair. 
Ruthless creditors sold the righteous for silver and 
the needy for a pair of shoes. So little was their 
religion an influence for justice or mercy that the 
extortioners laid themselves down beside every altar 
upon clothes taken in pledge. The masses suffered 
from the utmost hardships, not the result of the 
conditions of their labor but of oppression and 
expropriation; and all kinds of cruel oppression, 
injustice, extortion, and dishonesty in business are 
amongst the vices imputed to the rulers. In early 
times the ethical sense as part of the religious experi- 
ence had manifested itself in a stern indignation 
against isolated acts of tyranny. One may refer 
to such instances as Nathan’s denunciation of David 
(II Sam. xii. 1), Ahijah’s protest against Solomon’s 
foreed labor for his court and palaces, and Elijah’s 
conduct on the occasion of the murder of Naboth 
(I Kings xxi. 17-24). But now the development of 
the court and military aristocracy which changed 
the earlier simplicity of Hebrew life produced great 
contrasts of rich and poor. With this came all the 
evils of oppression, cruelty, bribery, and dishonesty 
which inevitably belonged to such a state. The out- 
ward ceremonials of religion were strictly observed 
but righteousness between men was forgotten. It 
was this sudden accentuation of the social contrast 
in the prosperous reign of Jeroboam IT in the North, 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 69 


and of Uzziah, Jotham and Ahaz in the South, 
which called for men of passionate and powerful 
speech who could command the audience of the 
people, and the situation produced some of the great 
prophets of Israel. These prophets were not pri- 
marily interested in individual acts of tyranny but 
were moved to prophecy by the ethical conviction 
that an immediate and fundamental reformation of 
national life was necessary, and by the feeling of a 
personal mission to be the spokesmen of a God of 
righteousness. : 

The history of religion shows even to the present 
day that there is no necessary connection between 
religious emotion and ethical conviction. Men may 
regard themselves the friends of God and yet be 
little concerned about their duties to their fellow- 
men. They somehow think of God as interested in 
religiosity—sacrifices, prayers, and worship—but 
entirely unconcerned about social ethics and right- 
eousness. The great prophets of Israel emphasized 
more than ever before that true religion means the 
fulfillment of man’s duty to man as well as to God. 
They stood out in their day as the champions of 
popular rights, as interpreters of the world history, 
and as projectors of an ideal future social state. 

Israel had had prophets for centuries previously, 
but the great prophets of this period differed in 
many respects from most of their predecessors. True, 
there were certain outstanding figures of the type of 
Samuel, Elijah, Elisha, etc.; but apart from a few 


70 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


men of this type the popular seers and the profes- 
sional prophets who preceded the new order 
answered a specific question usually in a favorable 
sense. In order to obtain access to the secrets of 
the issue they depended upon physical means such 
as the observation of signs, or ecstasy induced by 
music, but the great prophets of the new order now 
spoke from their immediate knowledge of God. 
They were impassioned but not ecstatic; possessed 
by the spirit of God yet masters of reason. Their 
thinking was immediately practical and they rested 
their case on logic and necessity. The new prophets 
of Israel were men who realized that Israel’s pur- 
pose in the world was not merely to be a com- 
fortable people but to exemplify the social righteous- 
ness which is the counterpart among men of the 
character of God. 

One of the earliest of the great prophets was 
Amos, who prophesied to the people of the Northern 
Kingdom. He described the many and heavy sins 
of the nation, especially of the dominant class. 
Merchants are dishonest, judges are corrupt; the 
needy are crushed, unchastity is general; debtors 
are sold into slavery for a trifling default; and greed, 
robbery, and violence prevail everywhere at the 
cost of the poor. But God’s perfect justice will 
exact the merited penalty. He sees God as a 
Builder standing beside a wall holding a plumb 
line in His hand, for God says, “I will set a plumb 
line in the midst of My people Israel; I will not 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 71 


again pass by them any more.” The God of Israel 
is an exact workman, a God of perfect justice, and 
His people now tested by the divine plumb line of 
righteousness is hopelessly out of true and shall be 
punished. God had been most kind to his people. 
He had brought them out of Egypt and led them 
forty years in the wilderness to possess the land of 
the Amorites, and He gave them prophets to teach 
them His ways; but all His efforts had been fruit- 
less. The primary things of religion are not sacri- 
fices and offerings but absolute justice. 


Shall horses run upon the rock? 

Will one plough there with oxen? 

That you have turned justice into gall, 

And the fruits of righteousness into wormwood? 


The burden of Hosea’s teaching is uttered in the 
entreaty, ‘“O Israel, return unto thy God for thou 
hast fallen by thy iniquity.” To him, Israel’s God, 
as we shall see later, is primarily a god of love and 
the whole history of Israel is a witness to His 
gracious kindness: ‘‘When Israel was a child I 
loved him and called my son out of Egypt. : I 
taught Ephraim how to walk; but they knew not 
that I healed them.” The book is a solicitous appeal 
to the people to turn away from their perfidious 
priests and teachers with their futile reliance upon 
blundering diplomacy. 

The next prophet, Micah, denounces the absentee 
landlords who amass great estates at the expense of 


72 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


the poor and who cast out toiling women and young 
children from their homes and even strip the gar- 
ments from unoffending peasants. 


Hear, I pray you, ye heads of Jacob, 

And rulers of the House of Israel, 

Is it not for you to know Justice? 

Ye, who hate the good and love the evil, 

Who eat the flesh of my people, 

And flay their skin from off them, 

And break their bones and chop them in pieces. 


Isaiah’s condemnations are also against the social 
iniquities practiced by the dominant class, and the 
lack of justice. He intervened in the politics of the 
times as critic and mentor and rested his judgment 
on eternal principles of righteousness. The day will 
come when a ruler will arise who, acting as supreme 
judge, will secure that justice for the poor which 
is so essential for a prosperous and peaceful com- 
munity. As a result of his strong government there 
will be universal peace instead of brutish warfare, 
that has hitherto destroyed all human achievements 
(x1. 6-9). 

Similarly, Jeremiah emphasizes that righteous 
government alone will never secure the ideal state. 
It is only by social purification, by writing God’s 
covenant on the hearts of the people, that the state 
will be reconstructed in righteousness. And his 
successor, Ezekiel, the priest-prophet of Babylon, 
lays the utmost stress on individual responsibility 
for sin and righteousness (xviii). ! 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 73 


Jeremiah tells us that as he looks about him he 
cannot find in the whole of Jerusalem a good man 
“that doeth justly, that seeketh truth” (v. 1). He 
feels that it is the supreme duty of the Hebrews 
to serve God with loyalty utterly disregarding the 
immoral deities of the heathen, and to live together 
in mutual justice and love as becomes the servants 
of the righteous God. During the last siege of 
Jerusalem when he was thrown into prison as a 
traitor he spoke of his great hope for the future 
when a king should reign in Jerusalem who will 
execute justice and righteousness in the land (xxxiii. 
14-16). 

Jeremiah believed in a future social state as a 
result of a socialized people who should passionately 
desire it. With a wonderful insight, which we 
greatly need today in our own social endeavors, he 
saw that this would come about as a result of 
individual and national regeneration. ‘The inner 
motive that comes when individual human hearts 
are stirred in a great enterprise and the social 
enthusiasm which results from united endeavor were 
combined in Jeremiah’s great expectation of the 
future: “Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that 
I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel 
and with the House of Judah... .I will put my law 
in their inward parts, and in their hearts will I write 
it ... for they shall all know me from the least of 
them unto the greatest of them” (xxxi. 31-34). 
This is one of the noblest words of prophecy. ‘“Jere- 


74 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


miah sees men with humble hearts, seeking each to 
do the will of God as he finds it in his own con- 
science and thus united together, seeking to organize 
a society in which justice and truth shall prevail. 
He has been called a pessimist. His is a faith in the 
reign of God and the possibilities of humanity that 
is fundamental evidence of ethical optimism.” 

Ezekiel’s chief contribution to the conception of 
an ideal social state is to be found in the latter part 
of his book (xl-xlviii). He looks forward to the day 
when the state would be one great religious com- 
munity in which one would be glad to live with his 
neighbor as becomes the members of a common 
faith. The priests will teach the people the differ- 
ence between sacred and profane, holy and common, 
clean and unclean (xliv. 23). The prince will no 
more be a tyrant (xlvi. 18). The nobles will remove 
violence in spoil and execute justice and righteous- 
ness, whilst harsh exactions will be abolished (xlv. 
9-12). The land will be divided equally amongst 
all the people and the stranger will share with the 
home-born (xlvii. 22 f.). In other words, there will 
be a real theocracy, for the name of the city will be 
“God is there” (xlviil. 35). 

Let us now consider the attitude of the great 
teachers of Israel toward the stranger. In the 
Levitical law strangers are divided into two clearly 
defined classes—Toshav and Ger. On the one hand 
there was the Gentile who did not desire permanent 
settlement in the land. He was known as Toshav 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 75 


and was only received into the social communion of 
the Jewish people and enjoyed the protection of the 
civil laws. The Ger, however, was also received into 
the religious communion of the Jewish congregation. 
Both classes, nevertheless, fully participated in the 
liberality and warmhearted sympathy of its code. 
The stranger and sojourner participated in the pro- 
tection of the cities of refuge, had the full rights 
to the gleanings of the fields and vineyards, to the 
spontaneous produce of the fields in the Sabbatical 
year, and were to be assisted like brothers in their 
distress. 

The stranger is to be accorded the strictest justice 
in his legal disputes with the Hebrew. ‘Cursed be 
he that perverteth the judgment of the stranger, the 
fatherless and the widow” is one of the impreca- 
tions pronounced on Mount Ebal. He was to receive 
his share of all public and private charities, and 
of the tithes of all agricultural produce. He was 
to be admitted to the festive repast connected with 
all social and religious entertainments, and we read 
how during the reign of Hezekiah the Passover fes- 
tival was celebrated by strangers as well as Hebrews 
from all parts of Palestine. In the Mosaic code 
there was scarcely any law or form of benevolence 
which was not applicable to the stranger as well as 
to the native-born. The Sabbath is extended to the 
stranger so that he may enjoy the benefit of rest 
as well as the native (Ex. xxiii. 12), and the fourth 
commandment of the Decalogue (Ex. xx. 10) 


76 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


ordained that the stranger in the gate as well as the 
Israelite cease from all labor. Later we read 
that the command concerning justice and consider- 
ation for the stranger is coupled with the appeal for 
others who need assistance, such as widows and 
orphans. The laws dealing with the stranger show 
indeed a distinct solicitude for those who are with- 
out a national bond, isolated and dependent: ‘“Thou 
shalt not oppress the stranger, for you know the 
feelings of a stranger, for you were strangers in the 
land of Egypt.’ God, who watches over the wel- 
fare of the orphan and widow, loves the stranger and 
gives him food and raiment. In imitation of this 
divine example the Israelites are commanded to love 
the stranger, and the recollection of Hebrew servi- 
tude in Egypt is thus used as a means of strengthen- 
ing that humane sentiment. 

One may refer also to the following biblical injunc- 
tions dealing with the stranger: (1) “One law and 
one manner shall be for you and for the stranger 
that sojourneth with you” (Num. xy. 16). 

(2) “And if a stranger sojourn with thee in thy 
land, thou shalt not vex him, but the stranger that 
dwelleth with thee shall be as one born among you 
and thou shalt love him as thyself” (Lev. xix. 33-34). 

(3) “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” 
(Lev. xix. 18). 

What a contrast this biblical command forms to 
the boasting humanitarianism of the Greeks to 
whom every non-Greek was a rightless barbarian! 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 77 


The prayer of consecration at the completion of 
Solomon’s temple entreated that, if a foreigner were 
to appear within its precincts to pour out his heart 
to God, his voice would be heard and his supplica- 
tion granted so that the God of Israel would be 
known and worshiped by all the nations of the 
earth (I Kings viii. 41-43). In later times we find a 
real sentiment of tolerance and religious freedom 
toward the stranger which calls forth our highest 
admiration. In Ezekiel there is a command to the 
stranger to draw away from idolatry, not out of 
regard for the religious purity of the Hebrews, but 
for his own sake, because he was to be counted as a 
citizen of the theocratic community provided he 
acknowledged God and led a virtuous life. 


THE STATUS OF WOMANHOOD IN THE BIBLE 


In all ages there have been earnest questionings in 
thoughtful minds regarding the true status of 
woman, and although the problem as to the relation 
of the sexes agitated the minds of many ancient 
thinkers, none of them rose to that stage of purity 
or gave woman that status which she obtained 
amongst the ancient Hebrews. Let us proceed to 
consider the status of woman in ancient Israel and 
compare their moral codes with those of other 
ancient races. 

The attitude of the Hebrews toward chastity 
and pure moral life are summed up in the words 
of Leviticus (xvii. 3-5); “After the doings of the 


78 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


land of Egypt, wherein ye dwelt, shall ye not do; 
and after the doings of the land of Canaan whither 
I bring you, shall ye not do: neither shall ye walk 
in their statutes. My judgments shall ye do and my 
statutes shall you keep to walk therein. I am the 
Lord, your God. You shall therefore keep my 
statutes and my judgment, which if a man do, he 
shall live in them. I am the Lord.” Then follows 
an enumeration of the laws of chastity. 

Adultery was most stringently forbidden and pun- 
ished (Ex. xx. 14), and in the case of wrongdoing 
on the part of the man, rectification and indemnifi- 
cation were commanded (Ex. xxii. 15-16). Out of 
the twelve curses in the Book of Deuteronomy, four 
are directed against this form of vice (Deut. xxvii. 
20-23). The Pentateuch contrasts the character of 
Potiphar’s wife—cruel, bold, lustful—with that of 
Joseph with his fine strain of idealism and moral 
purity. Josephus who gives a detailed account of 
the story of Potiphar’s wife describes her as having 
fallen in love with him on account of the beauty of 
his body and his dexterous management of affairs, 
and he tells us that when she failed in her design 
she was most cruel in her revenge. Political honors 
awaited him if he would only yield to her tempta- 
tion, for she was the wife of the prime minister of 
the land, but his resistance and moral purity as a 
worthy son of Rachel and Jacob and a true grand- 
son of Isaac brought him greater recompense from 


God. 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 79 


The daughter of a priest “who played the harlot” 
and the woman guilty of infanticide were to die by 
burning or stoning. Similarly, a man who seduced a 
damsel “in the fields” where she could not summon 
help was sentenced to die. The law protected a 
woman against false witness by her husband con- 
cerning her chastity. If the charge was true the 
woman must die by stoning; if the husband had 
falsified he must pay a heavy fine to the father of 
the damsel. Whilst marriage was regarded as a 
religious obligation, the Hebrews knew and empha- 
sized many laws of hygiene in their purification 
rites. By deed and law the religious leaders thus 
sought to purify the domestic atmosphere. Not 
only individuals but whole communities suffered 
punishment for acts of impurity against their 
women. And as one instance one need only refer to 
the story of the people of Shechem, who were made 
captive, according to the biblical story, for this 
reason, 

The Talmud says that Jerusalem was destroyed 
on account of the prevalence of unchastity (shame- 
lessness). The Rabbis permited any of the com- 
mandments to be transgressed where the preserva- 
tion of life was necessary except the three pertain- 
ing to idolatry, incest, and bloodshed. And it was 
Israel’s hold upon the virtue of chastity more than 
anything else that made Hellenism, especially of the 
degenerate Syrian type, repulsive to every earnest 
Jew. 


80 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


It is of interest to note how the prophets most 
sternly condemn every such form of immorality, 
and their condemnation of this type of iniquity is 
the most pronounced of their denunciations of the 
evils which existed in their days (Amos iv. 7; Hosea 
iv. 2, 13; Isa. lvii. 3, ete.). Idolatory and unchastity 
are always branded together, and even lack of 
modesty on the part of Israel’s women brings forth 
the severest condemnation of her prophetic teachers. 
Isaiah’s denunciation of some of the vain women of 
his day and their apparel would indeed be a lesson 
to many a woman of today: “Because the daughters 
of Zion are haughty and walk with outstretched 
necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they 
go and making a tinkling with their feet, therefore 
the Lord will smite with a scab the crown of the 
heads of the daughters of Zion and God will lay 
bare their secret parts. In that day the Lord will 
take away the beauty of their anklets, and the cauls, 
and the crescents and the pendants and the brace- 
lets and the mufflers, and the head tire, and the 
ankle-chains and the sashes and the perfume-boxes 
and the amulets, the rings and the nose-jewels; the 
festival-robes and the mantles and the shawls and 
the satchels; the hand-mirrors and the fine linen 
and the turbans and the veils.” 

The great prophet Hosea, burdened with a sense 
of his people’s sin, felt himself called upon by God 
to marry a lewd woman, and so the story of his 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 81 


life is made to symbolize the necessity for purity 
and chastity by his example of clean living and holy 
thinking. The bitter experiences of the prophet’s 
life teach him the meaning of the fruits of impurity. 
We can imagine from the account he gives in his 
book of the manner in which he appeared one day 
before a huge throng in the market-place, and there 
whilst the crowds were engaged in chattering about 
the latest sensations in the town, this cultured soul, 
standing on an improvised platform, begins a sermon 
with a text based upon an old Semitic belief that 
God was a sort of husband to his people. He tells 
his hearers the story of his wretched life and broken 
home, how he married a girl supposed to be pure, 
how the gossip in the town as to the suspicions 
about her finally reached his ears and he therefore 
named his second child “Unpitied,’ and when the 
third child came and he confirmed for himself the 
truth of all this gossip he called it ““Not my people.” 

His wife gradually sank deeper into the mire, 
but in spite of all this he would not neglect her 
and finally brought her back out of the depth of 
shame. He then compares his own bitter experi- 
ences with his wife to the relationship of God to 
Israel. He says: “You, Israel, have been unfaith- 
ful to God just as my wife was unfaithful to me. 
And just as my love would not let me turn her loose, 
so has God’s undying passion for you kept you 
through all the years of shameless debauchery. 


82. JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


From the anguish of a broken-hearted husband I 
have felt my way to a broken-hearted God. I now 
realize that God was leading me through these bitter 
experiences to give me a message to you. My love 
for my wife was unabated in spite of her faithless- 
ness and I followed her to the end of her bitter 
shame with a boundless passionate devotion of a 
wounded soul. Similarly, God whose love never fails 
has been following you, O Israel, to the very limits 
of the world.” 

The romantic poetry of the Song of Songs shows 
that even under the coarse form which it took in 
Oriental life, love came to signify amongst the 
Hebrews a high, human relationship. And although 
it does not deal directly with any social problem but 
consists of a number of lyrics in thoroughly Oriental 
style, it makes a valuable addition to a great, ever- 
lasting theme—the purity, sweetness, and glory of 
love. The book is a portrayal of wedding customs 
amongst the Hebrew and other Oriental races, and 
we have a description of the love-songs and the 
gaiety and delight which accompanies true love- 
making in the East, but we have here also the sin- 
cere pledge of loyalty of the wife to her beloved. 


Set me as a seal upon thy heart, 

As a seal upon thy arm: 

For love is strong as death, 

Jealousy is cruel as sheol; 

The flashes thereof are flashes of fire, 
A very flame of God. 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 83 


Many waters cannot quench love, 
Neither can the floods drown it. 
If a man would give all the substance of his house for 
love, 
He would utterly be contemned. 
(Song of Songs, vil. 6, 7.) 


We have already noted how the Hebrews extended 
their respect for womanhood by showing practical 
sympathy for the widow in her sad life of loneliness 
and danger. On no account must the widow be 
wronged, for God is a father of the fatherless and 
the judge of the widows. The state was to provide 
for the care of widows in cases where they lacked 
financial means. “Seek justice, relieve the oppressed, 
judge the fatherless, plead for the widow” is the fine 
exhortation of Isaiah. 

The wife exercised an important influence in her 
home. She appears to have taken a part in family 
affairs and even to have enjoyed a considerable 
amount of independence. For instance, she enter- 
tains the guests at her own desire (II Kings lv. 8) in 
the absence of her husband and sometimes even in 
defiance of his wishes (I Sam. xxv. 14). She dis- 
poses of her child by a vow without any reference 
to her husband (I Sam. 1. 24); she consults with him 
as to the marriage of her children (Gen. xxvii. 46); 
and occasionally she criticizes the conduct of her 
husband in terms of great severity (I Sam. xxv. 2; 
IT Sam. vi. 20). 

The early chapters of Genesis, particularly, place 


84 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


the highest kind of estimate upon woman. We read 
_ that from the crudest form of animal life the creator 
proceeded to the highest in the animal creation. Each 
succeeding creation is higher than the previous. 
Adam appears as higher than the beast. But the 
crown creation is not in him but in woman. To 
quote the words of one biblical scholar, “If man is 
the head, she is the crown—a crown to her husband, 
the crown of the visible creation. The man was dust 
refined, but woman was dust doubly refined—one 
removed further from the earth.” We are told most 
beautifully “‘that woman was taken out of man, not 
out of his head to top him, nor out of his feet to be 
trampled under foot; but one of his side to be equal 
to him, under his arm to be protected and near his 
heart to be beloved.” 

The Bible presents man in the image of God, but 
in placing woman as the crown of creation it places 
her as his brighter image. Some of the most beauti- 
ful, touching, and tender portions of the Bible deal 
with woman. The tender history of the care of 
Moses’ mother for him; the tender care of Pharaoh’s 
daughter for the infant Moses; the tender history of 
Naomi and Ruth; the tender account of Hannah 
and the young infant Samuel—all present the Bible 
as a green spot in the desert when compared to the 
manner in which woman is represented in other 
Oriental literatures. 

Women are spoken of in the Bible as holding posi- 
tions of eminence, and there were the prophetesses 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 85 


Miriam, Deborah, Huldah. The advice of others 
was sought in emergencies. They took their part in 
public matters and appear especially as the “better 
half” of man. “Whoever findeth a wife findeth a 
good thing and obtaineth favor of the Lord” (Prov. 
XVlil. 22). Houses and riches a father can give; but 
a prudent wife is from the Lord (Prov. xix. 14). 
Touching is the record of the patriarch Abraham 
mourning the death of Sarah, the wife of his youth 
and companion in the trials and toils of his pil- 
grimage: “Abraham came to mourn for Sarah and 
to weep for her.” The poor old man, broken in 
heart, “a stranger and sojourner,”’ left alone with 
no place to bury the dead, and Abraham stood up 
before his dead and spoke to the sons of Heth, say- 
ing, “I am a stranger and a sojourner with you. 
Give me a possession of a burying place with you 
that I may bury my dead from before me” (Gen. 
xxiii. 1-20). 

We have now to consider the status of woman- 
hood and of morality amongst the Canaanites and 
other peoples into whose environment Israel was 
brought, and we at once realize the outstanding 
greatness and purity of the religious leaders and 
teachers of Israel. 

When the tribes of Israel conquered the Canaan- 
ites and took possession of their land they secured a 
national home in the midst of a kindred Semitic 
people, well advanced in civilization but morally cor- 
rupt and decadent. For a long time it was a ques- 


86 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


tion whether the Hebrews would be overwhelmed by 
the besetting temptations of their neighbors. The 
Canaanites saw no harm in things which the pure- 
minded Hebrew deemed infamous. They not only 
did not condemn revolting vices but even justified 
them, and went as far as to concentrate them as ele- 
ments in the worship of Baal, the god of fruitful- 
ness, and Astarte, the goddess of sexual love. The 
presence in ancient shrines of men and women who 
sought oneness with nature by imitating in a wild 
ritual of sensuality all the convulsions of her 
mysterious life was based on the naive belief that 
these practices tended to fertility wherever the 
nature gods exercised their power—in field and in 
vineyard, home and fold. The more the priests fed 
the mind of the people with this sensuous mysticism, 
the more the shrines were frequented and the 
revenues increased; whilst on every high hill and 
under every green tree God’s holy image in man and 
woman was desecrated. 

These practices were before the eyes of the Israel- 
ites, while they learned from the Canaanites not 
only the arts of tilling and planting, sewing and 
reaping, but the ways of winning the favor of the 
unseen givers of fertility, until for many of them, 
as for all the old inhabitants, the land flowing with 
milk and honey was haunted by gods and lords who 
taught their worshipers to revel in impurity. 

In Babylonia we hear of the mysterious rites 
which were employed in connection with certain 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 87 


practices in the temples to symbolize the fertility 
for which the goddess Ishtar stood, and we read in 
Herodotus (i. 199) about the obscenities connected 
with this form of worship. 

Enough has been said of the low status of woman 
and of the lack of consideration for the weaker sex 
amongst the neighbors of the Hebrews to make clear 
the unique purity of the Hebrew teachers and legis- 
lators in this respect. Let us bear in mind that 
the status of woman today is due to the Hebrew 
legislators who commenced by raising woman from 
her Oriental degradation and who, by their ethical 
doctrines and moral purity, elevated her status to 
the stage at which Christianity was able to spread 
these doctrines throughout the world. 

Can the modern mind conceive of a finer analysis 
of the true character of womanhood as the ideal 
home-maker than the one beautifully portrayed in 
the Bible? The woman who is possessed of the very 
finest qualities as wife and mother, who is efficient 
and far-sighted, industrious and helpful, a loyal 
wife, a religious influence in home and community, a 
generous mistress and benefactress bestowing honor 
upon her husband and'‘care on her children, is the 
woman blessed of God. 


A woman of worth who can find? 

For her price is far above rubies 

The heart of her husband trusteth in her, 
And he shall have no lack of gain. 

She doeth him good and not evil 


88 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


All the days of her life. 

She seeketh wool and flax, 

And worketh willingly with her hands. 

She is like the merchant-ships, 

She bringeth her food from afar. 

She ariseth also while it is yet night, 

And setteth forth provision for her household, 
And their portion for her maidens. 


She considereth a field, and buyeth it: 
With the fruit of her hands 

She planteth a vineyard. 

She girdeth her loins with strength, 

And maketh strong her arms. 

She perceiveth that her merchandise is good: 
Her lamp goeth not out in the day. 

She putteth her hands to the distaff, 

And her hands hold the spindle. 

She stretcheth her hands to the poor; 

Yea, she putteth forth her hands to the needy. 


She is not afraid of the snow, 

For all her household are clothed with scarlet. 
She maketh for herself coverings of tapestry, 
Her clothing is fine linen and purple. 


Her husband is known in the gates, 

When he sitteth among the elders of the land. 
She maketh linen garments and selleth them, 
And delivereth girdles unto the merchants. 
Strength and majesty are her clothing, 

And she laugheth at the time to come. 

She openeth her mouth with wisdom, 

The law of lovingkindness is on her tongue. 
She looketh well to the ways of her household, 
And eateth not the bread of idleness. 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 89 


Her children rise up and call her happy; 
Her husband also, and he praiseth her, saying: 
“Many daughters have done worthily, but thou excellest 
them all.” 
Favor is false, and beauty is vain: 
But a woman that feareth the Lord 
She shall be praised. 
Give her of the fruit of her hands; 
And let her works praise her in the gates. 
(Proverbs xxxi.) 


Tuer BIBLE AND KINDNEss ‘to ANIMALS 


The Hebrews placed domestic animals under the 
sparing protection and care of the law. The mouth 
of the threshing-ox is not to be muzzled (Deut. 
xxv. 4); on the Sabbath cattle also are given rest 
(Ex. xxiii. 11). The tenderness attached to animals . 
which shows itself in the command to which we have 
just referred—not to muzzle the ox that treads out 
the corn—or in the command to yoke together the 
ox and the ass, is one of the most beautiful features 
of the Bible. One is also reminded of the law for- 
bidding men to take a parent bird that was sitting 
on its young or on its eggs (Deut. xxu. 6-7). Let us 
compare these biblical provisions for animals with 
the cruelties to animals in gladiatorial exhibitions of 
civilized Greece, Rome and Spain, and note how 
outstanding is the biblical regard for every form 
of living creature. 

Our analysis of the main teachings of the Bible 
has shown us some of the great elements in its 


90 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


permanence. Human nature must change entirely 
before it ceases to need this literature. That it 
“finds us” as no other literature does is to Cole- 
ridge one proof of its divine origin. With what mar- 
velous persistence does it foster and encourage the 
best that is in us! It bids us admire the most 
admirable; cherish within us the hope of immor- 
tality; and rejoice in the love of God that passeth 
knowledge. Where else shall the reformer listen to 
to such passionate pleas on behalf of the poor and 
the outcast and the oppressed as burn on the lips 
of the Hebrew prophet? Where, as in this literature, 
can you find the power which can make mercy 
temper justice in the administration of the law? 
The truest feelings in our human nature respond 
to the spirit of the Bible. We cannot help noting 
that the Bible still responds to the deepest that is 
within us. In the craving of the soul for pardon and 
peace, light and leading, the Bible assures as does 
no other literature. Another man must be created 
before we need another Bible. Our conclusion is 
one and one only. The Bible must occupy a place 
in every Jewish home. Biblical exposition must 
regain its ascendancy in the pulpit. Bible reading 
must again be the rule and not the exception in our 
pews. The Bible itself must be the basis of devout 
and earnest and intelligent study, and it must 
become once again the choicest heritage of our race. 

We have discussed some of the fundamental 
aspects of the Bible broadly and without qualifica- 


THE GREATNESS OF THE BIBLE 91 


tion. But whilst its appeal to the heart is simple, 
its challenge to the intellect is complex. The per- 
ennial question for devout minds has been how to 
understand the Bible, and probably more earnest 
study has been expended upon it than on any other 
literature that has ever been presented to civilized 
man. It is our task in the course of the following 
chapters to consider the attitude of the Jew toward 
the Bible in the light of modern scientific knowledge 
and critical scholarship. 


AN ay Tt 
Swag ean A 
ae st 





? 
ash ' 
a? 
in ) 


f 
te 


The way to take the Bible seriously is to understand 
that those who wrote it were dealing with problems that 
we have to deal with now. They were men like our- 
selves, not angels, not mere savages; they were in a state 
neither of invincible ignorance nor of invincible omnisci- 
ence. They were not utterly right or utterly perverse. 
You cannot see the immense value, beauty, truth, passion 
of the Bible unless you rid your mind of all those pre- 
conceptions that will destroy its alertness. It is not that 
you mean to be critical; critical, that is, of other people’s 
ideas about the Bible. What you need is to take it so 
seriously as to forget other people’s ideas about it; to 
see it as the work of men who really were laboring to say 
something; and to try yourself, without prejudice, to 
understand what they were laboring to say. 


Ciutron Brock: Essays on Religion. 


93 





CHAPTER III 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES—-MORAL AND SCIENTIFIC 


The Bible permits customs and usages which would not be sanc- 
tioned by the modern mind—It is often attacked by many 
people on its ethical side—God no more forces an immedi- 
ately moral enlightenment upon an existing age than he 
instantaneously imparts a particular character to an indi- 
vidual—The cruelties of the ancient Hebrews—Character of 
David—Language of the imprecatory Psalms—Polygamy in 
the Bible—The Bible and modern science—Literalism of the 
Western mind—Harly chapters of Genesis. 


WE shall proceed to consider some of the so-called 
difficulties of the Bible—the difficulties concerning 
its morality, the difficulties concerning its science. 
The student of the Bible is often confronted with 
perplexity when many of its utterances are attacked 
as being below the level of the conscience of the 
modern mind, and there are many Jews whose faith 
in God and in Judaism has been thereby profoundly 
disturbed. They have noticed that the Bible permits 
customs and usages which would not be sanctioned 
by the modern mind of today, and they have found 
sentiments expressed in some of its books which they 
feel could not be approved by an all-wise, just God. 
They have found defects in the idea of duty as 

95 


96 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


measured by a later standard, customs and institu- 
tions which our conscience would not tolerate, and 
non-recognition of principles of conduct which to 
most of us seem self-evident. The modern mind is 
surprised that the Mosaic legislation should have 
permited slavery and polygamy, that a person of the 
type of David should be described as a deeply reli- 
gious man (in spite of his moral sin, the curses he 
invoked on his enemies, and his prayers for their 
destruction), that the command to exterminate the 
Canaanites is represented as coming directly from 
God, and that the Hebrews are even reproved for 
not executing it with sufficient thoroughness. This 
implication of God in the “lower morality” has 
caused difficulty to many a Jewish student of the 
Bible who has felt that the morality prescribed by 
God must be one and the same throughout, and that 
if the Bible is an inspired book the standard of its 
morality ought to be throughout of the very highest 
order. 

The Bible has often been attacked, therefore, by — 
many people on its ethical side and the character of 
the God of Israel vehemently assailed. Nietzsche 
spoke of the God of Israel as the arch-misleader of 
the human race whose morality is a morality for 
slaves, and Blatchford in his Heroes of the Bible 
expresses astonishment that such men as Moses and 
David should be glorified by men and women of 
to-day. But even writers from whom we would 
expect more than mere superficial knowledge of the 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 97 


Bible tell us “that the Hebrews were bound by moral 
obligation and the sanction of religion in their deal- 
ings with one another but were entirely free of these 
in their dealings with foreigners.” Any reader of the 
Pentateuch who is not biased by misconception or 
deliberate desire for perversion is bound to note 
from the first few chapters of Genesis how untrue 
such a statement is. 

Nevertheless, we must admit that such practices 
as slavery, polygamy, and blood-revenge as per- 
mitted to exist by the Bible writers are wrong, and 
this must have been God’s judgment on them at all 
times. If so, how does this affect our belief in the 
divine inspiration of the Bible? 

A closer examination of the whole problem shows 
us, however, that a deeper study of the Bible soon 
causes these difficulties to disappear, if only regarded 
from the right point of view. In the first place, we 
must remember that Judaism and Jewish ethics, 
whilst based on the Bible, have passed through a 
process of development. They are the result of one, 
continuous unfolding of the spirit of God through 
the Jewish people. If we regard the world as a great 
school from which God gradually selected Israel in 
order to teach humanity, morality and ethics, then 
the Bible is but one process in the unfolding of the 
spirit of God in Israel, and the Rabbinic and later 
Jewish writings are others. The race in its process 
of development and education is like the individual. 
Every race like every individual has a capacity for 


98 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


continual development. The human race can there- 
fore be compared to a colossal man whose life con- 
tinues for thousands of years. The successive gen- 
erations of men are days in this man’s life. The 
doctrines and creeds are his thoughts, the discoveries 
and inventions his works, and the states of society 
his manners. And just as in the process of teaching 
a child we must commence with the letters of the 
alphabet and gradually lead it onward, so in the 
education of a race we must commence with systems 
and practices of a comparatively low order and 
gradually advance upward. 

How unfair it is to describe the God of the Hebrew 
Bible as a capricious, cruel, and revengeful Being, 
as is so often done! It is true that here and there 
some of God’s ways in dealing with man as repre- 
sented in the Bible may seem incomprehensible to 
us. But if institutions were permitted to exist by 
the great teachers of Israel which to us seem degrad- 
ing, this is merely due to the fact that the Hebrews 
in spite of their religious genius were, after all, chil- 
dren of the age. In the words of one great teacher, 
“God no more forces an immediately moral enlight- 
enment upon an existing age than he instan- 
taneously imparts a particular character to an 
individual. He has endowed man with intellectual 
faculties of a certain kind, which move in a certain 
way and with a gradual progressive motion requir- 
ing time... the natural motion of a human under- 
standing is by steps and stages; one after another it 





BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 99 


is weary, sinks back exhausted, and cannot go 
farther just then, but rests, and there is a pause in 
the progress until another impulse comes. And thus 
the work is accomplished gradually and some large 
and complete truth is at last arrived at.” 

Suppose a judicious man appointed at the head of 
a body of semi-civilized Australian aborigines 
attempted to reveal to these poor creatures the 
higher aspects of life. He would try to teach the 
ideas of self-sacrifice, love of one’s enemies, chiv- 
alrous reverence for women and consecration of 
one’s life to God. But he would find that as the 
result of their previous modes of life—the drunken- 
ness and impurity, the murder and revenge to which 
they have been accustomed—it would be exceed- 
ingly difficult for them to appreciate even some of 
the things which are so apparent to himself. If he 
will only succeed in impressing upon them the sin- 
fulness of the most wicked things to which they have 
been accustomed, he will consider himself as in some 
degree successful. And if he is a wise, judicious man 
he will overlook much that grieves him and will 
tolerate for the time being many things of which 
he really disapproves. 

The words of Mozley, in his work Ruling Ideas in 
Early Ages, are of particular interest in this respect: 
“When you talk of the imperfect and mistaken 
morality of the Old Testament, ask yourself to 
begin with what you mean and what you intend to 
assert by the expression. Do you mean to assert 


100 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


that the written law was imperfect? If that is all, 
you state what is simply a fact; but this does not 
touch the morality of the Lawgiver, because he is 
abundantly fortified by the defence that He could 
give no higher morality at the time to an unenlight- 
ened people. Do you mean to assert that the scope 
and design was imperfectly moral? In that case 
you were contradicted by the whole course of his- 
tory. You blame in the God of the Bible what? 
The moral standard He permits? It is the highest 
man could then receive. The moral standard He 
desires? He desires a perfect moral standard and 
ultimately establishes it.” 

Historical revelation cannot at a stroke annihilate 
existing conditions and create a world of new ones. 
Revelation can only work in accordance with the 
laws of historical development. ‘Revelation takes 
up man as it finds him and does one thing at once— 
implants a truth, constitutes a relation, establishes 
a principle—which may have a whole rich content 
implicit in it, but it cannot convey to the recipient 
from the first a full all-round apprehension of 
everything which the principle involves.” Revela- 
tion must obviously begin somewhere and so it 
works patiently in accordance with the laws of his- 
torical development. It has to content itself in 
introducing new ideas and gradually overcoming 
and eliminating what is most objectionable; it has 
to content itself with bearing patiently with con- 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 101 


siderable evil, and replace the old whilst the good 
which it implants has time to grow and develop. 

Let us note further, however, that there are num- 
erous instances of Bible narratives which seem diffi- 
cult at first reading but are quite comprehensible 
when interpreted in the full light of history. The 
consideration of a few instances of this type will 
here suffice. 

The treatment of the Canaanites by the Hebrews 
and their utter extirpation is regarded by many 
people as cruelty of the very worst type. One can 
quite understand this attitude when the subject 
is looked upon from one point of view. But when 
regarded with an unbiased mind in the fuller light 
of history, one cannot help feeling that it may have 
been an eternal necessity that a nation such as the 
great majority of the Canaanites then were, sinking 
deeper and deeper into a slough of moral perversity, 
should fall before a people roused to a higher life by 
the newly awakened energy of unanimous trust in 
divine power. 

It may be argued that the people of Canaan 
were dealt with harshly in being so utterly destroyed 
and that it shows the utmost cruelty on the part of 
the Hebrews, but may it not also be regarded a 
work of mercy for the humanity of the future? 
Even as it was, the small portion of the Canaanites 
who were left and the nations around them so 
tempted the Israelites by their idolatrous practices 


102 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


that we read continually of all Israel turning away 
from God’s service and adopting the abominable 
vices that were connected with their forms of wor- 
ship. The Hebrews would have been overwhelmed 
by their influence had they been allowed to live 
side by side with them. The contest was not as to 
the fate of one of the nations of Palestine but as to 
the fate of humanity, and there may be some justi- 
fication for the statement that “the Israelites’ 
sword in its bloodiest executions wrought a work of 
mercy for all the world.” 

Again, if the Canaanites had been spared and 
reduced to slavery, the result, judging from analogy, 
would have meant the deep corruption of the 
Hebrews. “With abundance of slave labor, the 
Jews would not have taken to industry, nor have 
acquired the virtues which industry alone can pro- 
duce and guard. Their fate would have been like 
that of the Turks and other conquering hordes of 
the East, which, the rush of conquest once over, 
have sunk into mere slough and sensuality. And 
from what we know of the immorality of the 
Canaanites we can understand that the possession of 
such slaves by the Hebrews would have been 
depraving in the highest degree. Viewing the 
Israelites as the consciously commissioned ministers 
of heaven’s vengeance upon an utterly corrupt race, 
their case is lifted completely out of the common 
range of warfare and becomes entirely unique, no 
longer to be judged by ordinary, ethical standards.” 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 103 


Ottley well summarizes the whole situation when 
he says: 


Here is no partiality of a merely national God 
befriending His worshippers at the expense of others 
without regard to justice; here rather is a Power making 
for righteousness and against iniquity; yea, a Power act- 
ing with a beneficent regard to the good of humanity, 
burying a putrifying carcass out of sight lest it should 
taint the air. After all, the Canaanite nations were put 
under the ban, not for false belief, but for vile actions—a 
significant circumstance which plainly implies that in 
the execution of His righteous purpose, God is guided 
by one supreme aim, the elevation of human character. 
If Israel was duly to discharge its mission and to become 
the vehicle to mankind of a purer religion and loftier 
morality, 1t was necessary, humanly speaking, that a 
signal manifestation should be made at the very outset 
of its history, of the divine hostility to sin. It is to be 
observed finally that Israel itself is threatened with a 
similar judgment in the event of its yielding to the 
depraved rights or practices of Heathendom. These con- 
siderations at least suggest that the idea of individuality 
is one for which a model basis is required. The interests 
of morality may well have demanded an inexorably 
severe treatment of an evil which might have fatally 
thwarted God’s beneficent purpose for mankind at the 
very outset. It was more important that a people des- 
tined to be the missionary of the world should have a 
just conception of the meaning of divine holiness, than 
that it should learn the duty of respect for individual 
rights. 


Whilst therefore the traditional Jew of today does 
not seek to justify these cruelties and cannot and 


104 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


would not condone such actions which form so 
unpleasant a feature of the infancy of many ancient 
peoples (and unfortunately too many modern 
peoples also), he cannot help feeling that when 
viewed in the fuller light of history there may 
have been much greater necessity for some of these 
stern measures than most of us nowadays seem 
prepared to admit. 

Viewing the history of Israel throughout various 
periods we can account for the same spirit constantly 
prevailing. With all their faults Jepthah and Sam- 
son were engaged in a cause of the utmost impor- 
tance to the world, for they preserved unhurt the 
seed of eternal life and were the ministers of bless- 
ing to all other nations, though they thet aae 
failed to enjoy it. 

We are prepared to acknowledge that the days of 
the judges were days of rudeness and barbarity. 
In fact, the Bible itself declares this, but we have no 
difficulty in understanding how at times men of the 
type of Jepthah (whose actions and speech betray 
the very rudeness of his age) were inspired by the 
reality of revelation. Deborah was undoubtedly a 
real prophetess and possessed the qualifications nec- 
essary for judging the tribes of Israel, although 
the language she employs in her song of victory 
shows that she was in many respects a child of the 
age. 

Any unbiased student of the Bible must admit 
that no other religion of antiquity inculcated sym- 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 105 


pathy and mercy and condemned hatred and 
-revengefulness with the same decision and earnest- 
ness as the Book of Books. We have already noted 
how the stranger is to be treated as the home-born. 
The widow, the fatherless, the homeless, and dis- 
tressed are all under God’s protection, and the 
Mosaic code is full of provision for them. But 
where there is enmity to God or to the great causes 
of humanity, there the attitude of the Bible is one 
of uncompromising hostility. 

In this connection let us think also of the teach- 
ings of the great Rabbis who succeeded the biblical 
era. As we have already noted, Judaism whilst 
based on the Bible has been one continuous process 
of development, and its ethics and morality are the 
fruits of the inspiration of the Rabbis and teachers 
of the later periods of Jewish life, whose work is to 
be found in Talmud and Midrash, Halacha and 
Haggadah. The Rabbis showed the utmost toler- 
ance toward the non-Jew and taught that paradise is 
no privileged place for the Hebrew, as the pious 
among the Gentiles will also participate in eternal 
life. True, the Hebrews permitted the usage of 
blood-revenge, which was a very rude method of 
justice in a tribal state of society; but care was 
taken to make this right ineffective by the law of 
the Cities of Refuge. Their laws concerning mar- 
riage and divorce put restrictions on polygamy 
and the wanton putting away of a wife. And 
as we shall see later, after the Exile, particularly, 


106 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


monogamy seems to have become the prevailing 
rule. 

The character of David, who is represented in the 
Bible as a deeply religious man in spite of his sin 
against Uriah, has often caused much difficulty to 
students, although any true analysis of the details 
of his life shows ‘his real greatness. His sexual weak- 
ness which resulted in sin was certainly the most 
conspicious defect of his character; to it, as the 
historian clearly perceived, the greatest sorrows of 
his life were due. Let us note, however, that such 
a narrative would have been omitted altogether by 
any historian who was not in perfect accord with 
the aims and ideals of the truly moral life. The 
author of the Book of Chronicles does not repeat 
the story, feeling perhaps that it would not redound 
to the credit of one who was in other respects a God- 
fearing man in the finest sense of the term. 

The author of the Book of Kings, however, tells 
us the whole story as it occurred—the plain, simple, 
unvarnished truth. He attempts neither malice on 
the one hand nor extenuating circumstances on the 
other. The prophet Nathan gained for his people 
a great moral victory when they knew their monarch 
whose hands were stained with adultery and murder 
had humbled himself before God and said, “I have 
sinned.” 

Carlyle’s eloquent summary of the character of 
David may here be profitably recalled: “Who is 
called the man after God’s own heart? David, the 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 107 


Hebrew King, had fallen into sins enough—blackest 
crimes, there was no want of sin. And therefore 
unbelievers sneer and ask, ‘Is this, your man accord- 
ing to God’s own heart?’ The sneer, I must say, 
seems to me but a shallow one. What are faults, 
what are the outward details of a life, if the inner 
secret of it, the remorse, temptations, the often- 
baffled, never-ending struggle of it, be forgotten.... 
David’s life and history, as written for us in those 
psalms of his, I consider to be the truest emblem 
ever given of a man’s moral progress and warfare 
here below. All earnest souls will ever discover in it 
the faithful struggle of an earnest human soul 
toward what 1s good and best. Struggle often 
baffled—sore baffled—driven as into entire wreck; 
yet a struggle never ended, ever with tears, repent- 
ance, unconquerable purpose, begun anew.” If it 
is true that the greatest achievement of history is to 
develop the perfect and arm conscience, then we 
know more fully as we read such a tale how God 
effectively makes Himself known. 

We now come to the difficulty as to the impre- 
eatory Psalms. The attacks made upon the Bible 
on account of the revolting language of some of the 
Psalms are due entirely to misunderstanding. The 
modern mind finds no difficulty in understanding the 
words of comparatively modern poets for writing 
works of a similar nature. Why should an ancient 
poet be condemned for figurative language of that 
type? Let us consider the language of Milton, 


108 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


which is very similar. In one of his poems he 
writes: 


Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose bones 

Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold; 

Even them who kept thy truth so pure of old, 

When all our fathers worshipped stocks and stones,” . 
(Poem on Late Massacre in Piedmont.) 


Yet no one has condemned Milton for the expression 
of such sentiments, for it is generally understood 
that his language is purely poetic and figurative. 
Do we moderns reproach the laws of any people 
because like the imprecatory Psalms they so severely 
condemn and punish the transgressor? Why should 
we reproach the author of these Psalms for his 
writings? The psalmist as a deeply religious man 
expresses the curse of God against wicked men. 
Surely the tender character of the Hebrews forbids 
our believing that they should have desired such 
cruel punishments against any people unless they 
were criminals of the worst type who had committed 
the most heinous crimes. 

True, the language of these Psalms is revolting 
to the modern mind, nor is it in accordance with our 
conceptions of Jewish ethics; but we must also 
remember that these are figurative poems, written 
with the bold metaphor and startling hyperbole 
which is the true characteristic of Oriental style. 
Max Miller has rightly pointed out that if we per- 
sist in understanding the words of Oriental writers 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 109 


in their outward aspect only and deliberately mis- 
interpret their language, the fault is ours, not theirs. 
And he rightly continues that half of the difficulties 
in the history of religious thought owe their origin 
to the constant misinterpretation of ancient 
language by modern language, of ancient thought by 
modern thought. 

“Ts it not remarkable that the Hebrews with all 
their moral purity and their high conception of 
womanhood should have encouraged polygamy?” 
This and statements of a similar kind have been 
made time after time. Let us note at once that the 
Bible condones polygamy but certainly does not 
encourage it. The patriarchs Abraham and Jacob 
had more than one wife, but further consideration of 
the facts shows clearly that their action was contrary 
to the divine order from the beginning. According 
to the Oriental mode of expression, to represent the 
first man as having had one wife only was as much 
as to say that monogamy was the ideal system. 
“Therefore, shall a man leave his father and mother 
and shall cleave unto his wife and they shall be one 
flesh” are the words uttered by the inspired voice 
from Eden. 

In the early period of Israel’s history there was a 
desire to increase the number of the race and the 
addition of women as wives and concubines served 
both for reproduction and protection. As the 
Hebrews conquered their neighbors they inter- 
married with them in spite of the decrees against 


110 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


these privileges, and we read often with implied 
reproach of the many wives which they had during 
the periods of the Judges and the Kings. 

True, it was only comparatively late in history 
that man decided to establish the institution of 
monogamous marriage, but in theory it is already 
there in the Bible. The prophets constantly used 
the symbol of the abiding union of one man with 
one woman as a symbol of the union of God with 
His people, while polygamy and its counterpart, 
idolatory, are branded in many prophetic pages. 
Monogamy is always commended as being a life 
of deepest joy. ‘‘Whoso findeth a wife findeth a 
good thing” (Prov. xvill. 22); “Rejoice with the wife 
of thy youth” (Proy. v. 18); “A prudent wife is 
from the Lord” (Prov. xix. 24)—these are but a few 
of the passages which illustrate this point. In each 
case one notes that the singular “wife,” not the 
plural, occurs. 

If the Hebrew legislators could not abolish polyg- 
amy altogether in the earliest periods of their his- 
tory, they at least modified the existing system so 
that the handmaid or concubine was treated with 
very great consideration. She could not be sold into 
slavery and careful provision was made for the 
captive women who were concubines. Active 
measures were taken for the legal regulation of the 
system, so as to confine the practice within narrower 
limits. We will consider some of these. The law 
in Deuteronomy, voicing the sense of the calamities 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 111 


polgamy brought upon royalty and the nation, for- 
bids kings to multiply wives (Deut. xv1i. 17). Again, 
the law addressed itself with great earnestness to 
the protection of the interests of the several wives 
and the amelioration of the condition of the slave- 
wives. We read in Exodus (xxi. 7) how the Israel- 
itish woman who has been purchased for a slave-wife 
must be set free if three conjugal rights are with- 
held from her. Even the foreign slave-wife, cap- 
tured in war, is to be treated with consideration. 
She is to be allowed a month of mourning, and her 
master, after living with her as his wife, is forbidden 
to sell her (Deut. xxi. 10). If a woman loses her 
husband’s affections, the law insists that her son, 
if the firstborn, shall receive his due portion (Deut. 
xxl. 15-18). 

We notice that after the account of the first man 
who only had one wife, when the narrative con- 
tinues to relate the corruption of a later period, 
polygamy makes its appearance in the lawless line of 
the Canaanites (Gen. Iv. 23). Noah, the second 
father of the human race, also represents monogamy 
(Gen. vil. 7), and there seems to be an apologetic 
strain for the polygamy of the patriarchs. It is 
Sarah’s desire for children that causes Abraham to 
take another wife (Gen. xvi. 1), and the polygamy 
of Jacob seems due to his having been deceived by 
Laban (Gen. xxix. 23). 

A true survey of the history of Israel gives us 
every justification for regarding many of the leaders 


112 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


of the Hebrews who had more than one wife as the 
victims rather than the authors of the public insti- 
tution of polygamy and serfdom; whilst after the 
Exile monogamy certainly became the prevailing 
rule. | 

We may note here that the Talmudic scheme of 
married life is based entirely on a monogamous basis 
and that there is no reference in the Talmud to a 
man’s wives but always to his wife. Dr. Israel 
Abrahams discusses the question at length in his 
~ book Jewish Life in the Middle Ages, and the fol- 
lowing quotation from this work may not be out of 
place here: “(Monogamy was not the condition and 
basis of a pure home life; the assertion that it was 
so transposes cause and effect. Monogamy was the 
result and not the cause of the idealized conception 
of the family relations. The hallowing of the home 
was one of the earliest factors in the development of 
Judaism after the Babylonian exile and the practice 
of monogamy grew up then as a flower of the family 
hearth. The whole of the Talmud is based on 
monogamous custom. The allusions to women 
throughout its pages invariably presuppose such a 
custom, for although the Jewish law permitted 
polygamy, Jewish practice very early abrogated the 
license.” 

Finally we may point out that the oft-repeated 
statement that monogamy was primarily a Christian 
institution introduced by the founders of Chris- 


tianity is entirely incorrect. In the literary remains — 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 113 


of a Jewish sect, published by the late Dr. 
Schechter, under the title of Fragments of a Zado- 
kite Work, polygamy is strictly prohibited, and even 
marriage with another woman while a man had a 
divorced wife living was regarded as fornication and 
was apparently put in the same category with hav- 
ing two wives at the same time. This sect, the date 
of which may be fixed roughly at about 200 B.c.z., 
has been shown by Professor Louis Ginzberg to have 
been a strictly Pharisaic sect. Its principal seat was 
in the region of Damascus where its adherents 
formed numerous communities. We thus see how 
the tendency to legislate against polygamy by at 
least one Jewish sect antedates the Christian era. 
Let us now proceed to consider some of the diffi- 
culties which have been agitating the minds of many 
traditional Jews as to the variances between num- 
erous references to scientific thought in the Bible 
and those accepted by modern science. Our diffi- 
culties in this respect are due merely to our attempts 
to regard the Bible as a manual of twentieth-cen- 
tury astronomy and geology and to our insistence on 
treating it as a modern book of science and history 
instead of regarding it as a book of religion. These 
difficulties would disappear entirely if we would not 
attempt to test the ethical value of the Bible or 
defend or deny its inspiration from the twentieth- 
century standpoint of history and scientific criticism. 
Our fathers, believing that every reference 
throughout the Bible to the phenomena of nature 


114 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


must be taken literally, were forced to the position 
either that any advance to a clearer knowledge of 
the science of nature must be set aside as fiction, or 
that the Bible was in many places unscientific and 
untrue. 

In this connection one is reminded of the ridicu- 
lous encounters between the Christian theologians 
and astronomers some four hundred years ago. 
Theology had agreed with the old astronomy that 
the earth was flat and square and stationary. The 
new astronomy declared the earth to be a revolving 
globe, rushing through the stellar spaces. Theology 
taught that the universe was a sort of two-story 
basement building—earth being the parlor floor, 
heaven the upper floor, and hell the basement. 
Where was heaven and where was hell if the earth 
turned up and sped onward? It was regarded as a 
test case and a fight to the very death, for the Bible 
was believed to be opposed to this new astronomy. 
If the new astronomy gained the day, faith was 
doomed. Luther’s arguments were that the Bible 
is infallible and that it speaks of “the four corners 
of the earth,” but a sphere has no corners, and if the 
Bible is mistaken then all faith in God must dis- 
appear. The new astronomy won the day, but 
religion in its various forms has still remained. 

We feel that all these difficulties will disappear if 
we bear in mind that the views of the origin and 
laws of the physical universe which are found in the 
Bible are views which were current at the time those 





BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 115 


_ writings were composed, and it is not surprising 
therefore that these views do not correspond with 
present-day astronomy or biology. The Bible was 
written in the Orient in the first instance for 
Orientals of the time, and we cannot therefore 
expect to find it a manual of present-day views of 
physics and chemistry. Bible statements concerning 
topics within the realm of science must be con- 
sidered as giving the views of their times and as 
containing just such truth as had been reached by 
the processes of thought and observation which had 
been developed up to that time. An explanation in 
the Book of Genesis of the processes of the develop- 
ment of order, beauty, and life such as scientists give 
today would have created in those days false impres- 
sions instead of true ones. ‘These writings were 
composed first of all for the people of the time 
in which they were read, written in the language and 
reflecting the highest ideas of the time. 

Every book must be judged in the light of its 
purpose. A book dealing with physics or chemistry 
must be held responsible for those subjects and noth- 
ing else. If it contains references to history or 
philosophy which are not exactly in accordance 
with present-day accepted views, that would not 
modify our opinions of its scientific value. So the 
Bible must be judged in the light of its purpose, 
which is to bring God and men into such satisfying 
relations with each other that they will work 
together for the creation of a new social order char- 


116 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


acterized by holy living and righteousness. The 
infallibility of the Bible does not depend upon our 
acceptance of its references to science or astronomy, 
but upon its effective achieving of the end it sought 
and still seeks. And we maintain that it has always 
accomplished and still succeeds in accomplishing 
this purpose. 

We must bear in mind that the references in the 
Bible to geography, astronomy, and other branches 
of science occur not in a treatise on geography or 
astronomy but in a treatise on religion. And when 
terms had to be used to describe natural phenomena, 
those in popular use had to be employed. ‘There 
were no others known. Even if modern terms had 
been known and used by a selected few, they would 
have been misunderstood. The references to cur- 
rent, scientific conceptions do not detract one jot 
from the value of a book the object of which was to 
teach religious truth. 

Let us remember that in every respect excepting 
their remarkable knowledge of divine truths the 
authors of the various books of the Bible were like 
their neighbors. They had no special knowledge 
above their fellows as to general science and history 
and did not pronounce their revelations in a scien- 
tific form. If this had not been the case, how utterly 
unintelligible would their words have been to their 
fellow men! Conceive of a prophet or psalmist, 
endowed with prophetic knowledge, and talking of 
the various geological periods in the history of the 


7 ee 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES . 117 


earth or of the planetary system according to the 
Newtonian laws, instead of simply declaring “In 
the beginning God created the Heavens and the 
Earth,” and speaking of “the Sun going forth as a 
bridegroom to run his course.” 

The authors of the Bible disclosed the mighty 
truths of God in the common and ordinarily pictur- 
esque and poetic language of the days in which they 
lived. This form, now requiring study and reflection 
to apprehend its meaning, was inseparable from 
their daily life and the only common medium for 
the conveyance of revelation to all ages. In no other 
form, humanly speaking, would they have struck so 
deeply into the mind and heart of men or clung to 
them with such unseverable tenacity. We regard 
these books as the oracles of God in their divine 
instructions, while the language in which they were 
spoken was human and uttered in a style to be 
understood by men of all ages. 

The Bible is literature—religious literature. Its 
entire purpose is to portray, illustrate, exhort, and 
beget the life of reverence and prayer and hope and 
fraternity and purity and sympathy. It makes use 
of all outward things merely to unfold and inspire 
the life of righteousness and worship. Its writers 
accepted the common ideas and beliefs of their time 
and used whatever came to hand for the illustration 
of model and spiritual truths. Again, in attempting 
to understand the Bible, as well as other Oriental 
literatures, our difficulties are caused by the fact that 


118 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


we are such literalists in this Western and scientific 
world. We find it so difficult to break away from 
things physical, and in our devotion to material 
facts we take some of the beautiful visions and sub- 
lime rhetoric of biblical literature and degrade it into 
cast-iron contradictions of science. We can only 
overcome these difficulties by realizing the poetic 
spirit of the people who wrote the Bible and of the 
language in which it is writter. 

Every general truth expressed by the Hebrews is 
rendered with the utmost directness, and in phra- 
seology as pictorial, as elemental, as stimulating to 
iniagination and feeling as possibly could be. Such 
a language is the very language of poetry. The 
medium through which poetry works is the world of 
sensible objects—wine and oil, the cedar of Lebanon, 
the moon, the cloud, the smoking hills. In order to 
make poetry out of materials one requires intensity 
of feeling, elevation and coherence of thought, and 
these were the very endowments of the Hebrews. 
On the one hand they were close to nature; they 
had not parceled out their human constitution into 
separate and independent faculties, nor had they 
interposed a hubbub of words between themselves 
and things. They were still capable of naive views, 
powerful sensations, and vigorous convictions; on 
the other hand, they had, as tending to coherence 
and elevation of thought, what to them was a 
sufficient explanation of all the wonders of the uni- 
verse and a sufficient impulse to lift up their hearts 


oe 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 119 


—an overmastering belief in God, the Creator, God 
the Maintainer, and for those who trust and love 
Him, God the Deliverer. 

Many Jews find difficulty in understanding the 
Mosaic narrative of creation in view of the teach- 
ings of twentieth-century science. There is certainly 
no portion of the Bible which has caused greater 
difficulty in this respect than the first chapter of 
Genesis. Commentators and _ teachers have 
expended more time in attempting to reconcile cer- 
tain of its declarations with the known or supposed 
teachings of science than on any other aspect of 
biblical literature. 

_ It used to be taken for granted by scientists and 
theologians in their controversies that we have here 
a literal account of the making of the universe in six 
days of twenty-four hours each and that we must 
accept the various stages of creation in the order 
given, and the slightest proved inaccuracy will 
totally invalidate the trustworthiness of the whole. 
Again, all kinds of interpretations have been given 
to the Hebrew terms used in Genesis in order to 
make them more reconcilable with the teachings of 
modern scientific thought. For example, we are told 
by some scholars that the word “‘days” is not to be 
taken in a literal but in a figurative sense. It means 
not the ordinary day but the work of creation which 
was unfolded in time by a series of progressive trans- 
formations. For a similar reason, the words “eve- 
ning” and “morning” are interpreted metaphorically 


120 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


as meaning not dusk and dawn but the beginning 
and end of the divine works. 

To the modern Jew all these controversies are of 
purely academic interest, for success in either one 
direction or another cannot modify our attitude 
toward the Book of Books. Whether the first chap- 
ter of Genesis is science to the scientist or history to 
the historian does not affect our attitude to Judaism 
and the Bible one iota. For to us it is primarily a 
hymn of creation which takes this form so as to 
impress upon man throughout all ages that it was 
God, the great creative spirit, who brought every- 
thing into existence. To quote the words of Elmslie, 
“The idea of the arrangement followed is on the face 
of it (not chronological) but literary and logical. It 
is chosen for its comprehensiveness, its all-inclusive 
completeness. To declare of every part and atom 
of nature that it is the making of God, the author 
passes in procession the great elements or spheres 
which the human mind everywhere conceives as 
making up the world, and pronounces them, one by 
one, God’s creation. Then he makes an inventory of 
their entire furniture and content, and asserts that 
all these are likewise the work of God. For his 
purpose—which is to declare the universal creator- 
ship of God and the uniform creature-hood of nature 
—the order is unsurpassed and unsurpassable. With 
a masterly survey which marks everything and 
omits nothing, he sweeps the whole category of 
creative existence, collects the scattered leaves into 


mes 


BIBLE DIFFICULTIES 121 


six congruous groups, encloses each in a compact 
and uniform binding, and then, on the back of the 
numbered and uniformed and ordered volumes, 
stamps the great title and declaration that they are 
one and all, every jot, tittle, shred, and fragment, 
the works of their Almighty author, and of none 
beside.” 

To us the purport of the Mosaic account of the - 
Creation is not to teach geology, physics, zoology, or 
astronomy, but to affirm in the most simple and 
direct manner the creative act of God and His sov- 
ereignty over all creatures. Its object is not to 
anticipate any of the truths of science or philosophy 
but to guard the Hebrews against the pernicious 
errors and idolatrous practices which were then 
everywhere prevalent. 

Let us note, further, in considering the first chap- 
ter of Genesis that the cosmogony of Moses is the 
only one which antiquity has left us that can claim 
our assent or challenge the investigation of science. 
There may be passages in it which do not at present 
admit of a satisfactory explanation, but there is 
nothing involving contradiction, and still less is 
there anything that can be crowned with absurdity. 
It is absolutely peerless compared with the other 
cosmogonies of the ancient world and it is as far 
above them as history is above fiction, as truth 
above falsehood. One has only to place the Mosaic 
account of creation side by side with the cosmogonies 
of other nations of antiquity who, in many respects, 


122 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


were far above the Hebrews in civilization and cul- 
ture to realize the greatness of the Bible. The spade 
of the excavator has been revealing to us within 
recent years the wonderful creations in science and 
art of some of the Oriental nations who were neigh- 
bors of the Hebrews, and yet how different is their 
conception of the creation of the universe from that 
of the Hebrews! 

With a few bold strokes we are given the picture 
of the history of creation telling us how in the begin- 
ning God created heaven and earth. There is no 
ambiguity, vacillation or obscurity in the words of 
the Hebrew writer, who in a single sentence con- 
demns the dualism of the Eastern sage and the 
dectrine of the eternity of matter of the Greek 
Sophist. 


Great floods have flown 
From simple sources, and great seas have dried 
When miracles have by the greatest been denied. 


SHAKESPEARE: All’s Well That Ends Well, 
Act IT, Scene I. 


The progress of our knowledge will not eliminate the 
miraculous but will enlarge our perception of it. It will 
transfer our interest from the infrequent disclosure of 
God in the marvelous and the dramatic to the constant 
disclosure of God in the ordinary course of daily life 
. . . indeed, it is in the miracle of the commonplace, not 
in the miracle of the crisis, that God is most evidently 
manifested. This is his accustomed disclosure. The 
undivineness of the natural and the unnaturalness of the 
divine has well been called the great heresy of popular 
thought respecting religion. 


Hopces: Hvery Man’s Religion. 


123 





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CHAPTER IV 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 


“Tt takes a miracle to prove a miracle’—Recent developments 
in science would have been regarded as miraculous a few 
years ago—Various definitions of miracle—Natural law—We 
may argue that miracles do not happen, but we have no 
right to say that miracles cannot happen—The Rabbis 
pointed out that the true greatness of a prophet is not to 
be measured by the miracles he performs, but by the content 
of his message—“The Jews ask for signs as the Greeks seek 
for wisdom”—The symbolism of language—Joshua’s com- 
mand to the sun—The Book of Jonah—Suggestion and auto- 
suggestion—The beliefs of all ancient races in miracles are 
the means of strengthening our faith in God—Danger of 
eliminating the miraculous entirely from Jewish history— 
Whether the modern Jew accepts certain literal accounts of 
miraculous events or not, he must admit that God did lead 
his people “with a mighty hand and with an outstretched 
arm and with signs and wonders.” 


WE will now proceed to consider the problem of 
the miracles in the Bible, a subject which has been 
causing considerable difficulty to many modern Jews. 
In fact, some of the Bible miracles, such as the 
“standing still of the sun at Joshua’s behest,” the 
story of Balaam’s ass, and the account of Jonah and 
the whale, to mention but a few instances, are often 
the causes of considerable amusement to the modern 
mind. 

125 


126 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Again, we are told that the effect of the universal 
recognition of the exclusion of the miracle from our 
view of history as a principle of criticism must result 
in eliminating the miraculous from Jewish history. 
Let us therefore proceed to consider this problem in 
detail. 

In the first place, we must realize that if we are 
to prove that an event is miraculous in the same 
sense in which it was looked upon by our fathers, 
we should have to prove that in addition to our 
present impossibility to assign it its place in any 
observed sequence, we shall never be able to do so 
in the future, and this 1s obviously impossible. - It 
is therefore perhaps correct to argue that it takes 
a miracle to prove a miracle. 

Again, our modern critical scholars, starting out 
with the axiom that miracles are impossible, are 
often tempted to regard the text of the Bible con- 
taining such narratives as later embellishments of 
the original occurrence. In fact, the impossibility of 
miracles is no longer regarded by many as an 
hypothesis, but as an established truth. As Jews, 
however, we cannot help noting that many of those 
scholars who regard the Old Testament miracles as 
beyond the bounds of possibility never question the 
actual occurrence of the Gospel miracles, and even 
regard them as overwhelming proofs of the Christian 
revelation. 

We are prepared to agree that, if the narrative of 
a miraculous occurrence can be shown upon sound 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 127 


historical evidence to be spurious, then the critics 
have a right to exclude it from the original text. 
But we certainly have no justification for ridiculing 
the miracles of the Bible, or omitting them from the 
text, merely because we cannot understand them. 
Do we understand how the grass grows at our feet, 
how the egg becomes a bird, or how the butterfly 
can be the same creature which only a few months 
previously was a crawling caterpillar? Is not the 
new life which springs forth daily from life preced- 
ing a miracle in itself? Is not the very law of 
gravitation by which the stone cast into the air 
is compelled to move downward a miracle? The very 
life of man, the combination of matter and spirit, 
the interdependence of mind and body are miracles 
in themselves. Surely, the more we think of the 
miracles of the present, the easier it is for us to 
understand the miracles of the past. In the words 
of one philosopher, “The fact that one meets the 
miraculous in his own experience makes it entirely 
unnecessary to stumble at the miracles which others 
have experienced.” 

To the Jew who implicitly believes in the miracles 
of the Bible, in the popularly accepted sense of the 
term “miracle,” and regards them as forms of the 
arbitrary suspension of cosmic law by divine fiat, 
there are no difficulties in this connection. But how 
is the matter to be explained to other Jews who 
from the dawn of their intellectual maturity have 
stumbled at the miracles of the Bible, and have 


128 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


thereby been led to breathe the arid air of unfaith? 
To many of these Jews all the Bible narratives about 
the superphysical are fairy tales, human dreams. 
They insist that in this age of science we cannot 
speculate about airy phantoms of our own, but must 
stand upon the firm rock of reality. The natural 
sciences have taught us how to weigh matter and 
analyze its component parts. How, therefore, can 
we be expected to believe in miracles? They tell us 
that it is not rational to believe in miracles, and that 
the modern mind cannot accept the miraculous 
because it is contrary to all scientific facts. They 
start out with the presupposition that miracles are 
incredible and are the expression of a supernatural- 
ism which is to them unacceptable (though there is 
a considerable difference of opinion amongst them 
as to what this supernaturalism actually is), and 
‘they emphasize that “nothing can press on the soul 
of man with the leaden weight of inscrutable 
authority.” 

Let us consider whether it is really fair to argue 
that the belief in the miraculous is contrary to scien- 
tific facts. In the first place, it is interesting to note 
that the scientific attitude to miracles is much less 
hostile nowadays than it was a century ago, and the 
new vistas open to science have made a spiritual 
interpretation of the universe more possible. In 
fact, we note with pleasure that the attitude of men 
of science toward manifestations of things of which 
they had previously not even dreamed is no longer 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 129 


the arrogant scepticism of former days, which often 
deliberately refused to enlarge its bounds to admit 
the new fact. In fact, there is more justification for 
our saying that in the realm of physical science the 
border-line between knowledge and what our pre- 
decessors would assuredly have called the ‘‘unknow- 
able” has become vague, nay, has practically dis- 
appeared. Fortunately, we are now beginning to 
_ realize how absurd such an attitude is, for we see 
daily before our eyes developments in science which 
would have been regarded as ‘miraculous’ beyond 
the bounds of possibility only a few years ago. We 
seem to see daily how science itself is putting an 
end to the dogma of the impossibility of miracles. 

Have we not been witnessing miracles in our own 
day? Has not nature entrusted us with some of her 
secrets by means of which we have been enabled 
to revolutionize the universe—our perfection of the 
steamer and the aeroplane; and the recent eclipsing 
of the telephone and the telegraph by our ability to 
write and speak on the waves of the air. Man is 
thus compelled to feel that if he who had no hand in 
the creation or arrangement of these forces can 
gain some mastery over them, surely the intelligent 
power who planned and executed them to his will 
can direct and control these forces according to his 
desire. 

If we had been informed about half a century ago 
that certain rays of light, invisible themselves to our 
eyes, could penetrate various substances and make 


130 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


the very skeleton of the human frame visible, should 
we not have regarded it as miraculous? Would not 
our ancestors have regarded a piece of radium, no 
larger than the head of a pin and yet possessed of 
such an enormous and inexhaustive abundance of 
heat and light, as a miracle in itself? Dr. Harker, 
F.R.S., a distinguished English scientist, in a paper 
on “Science and the Unknown,” writes: “As an illus- 
tration of what might be called a genuine scientific 
miracle, insomuch as it has appeared to be incon- 
sistent with accepted fundamental principles, let us 
take the discovery of X-rays, which, as all the world 
knows, was made by Rontgen in 1895. I well remem- 
ber the sensation aroused in Manchester when some 
of the first photographs of his results were sent by 
Rontgen to Professor Schuster. The interest they 
excited was profoundly greater than that of an 
ordinary nine-days’ wonder. One photograph was 
that of the bones of the hand, hazy and ghostlike, 
and many who saw it were utterly sceptical as to 
its genuineness; others scoffed.” 

Surely, we who are constantly witnessing the 
miraculous ought to be the last people to doubt its 
possibility. To argue that science has declared 
miracles impossible and that their impossibility can 
be scientifically demonstrated is absolutely erroneous 
and untrue. Many of us actually feel a difficulty 
in the use of the terms “natural” and “super- 
natural,” seeing that no definite line of demarcation 
can be drawn between them. All that we can say 


NS a. _. 


ee. ee, ee 


———— 





JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 131 


is that we need the term “nature” to express the 
visible world with its law and order, and the term 
“supernatural” to express that which lies in the 
unknown beyond. In fact, it is often the perfectly 
smooth and uniform which is the most difficult to 
perceive. Sir Oliver Lodge aptly illustrates this: 
“Those fish, for instance, which are submerged in 
ocean depths, beyond the reach of waves and tides, 
are probably utterly unconscious of the existence of 
water; and, however intelligent, they can have little 
reason to believe in that medium—notwithstanding 
that their whole being, life and motion are depend- 
ent upon it from instant to instant. The motion of 
the earth, again, furious rush though it is—fifty 
times faster than a cannon ball—is quite inappre- 
ciable to our senses; it has to be inferred from 
celestial observations and it was strenuously dis- 
believed by the agnostics of an earlier day.” 

But before we proceed to a fuller discussion of the 
subject, let us try to understand what exactly is 
meant by the term “miracle.” Various definitions 
have been given. It has been defined by some as 
“‘an occasional evidence of direct divine power in an 
action striking and unusual.” Others again regard it 
as “that which violates the principles of the order 
to which it belongs.” Locke defined the miracle as 
“a sensible operation, which being above the com- 
prehension of the spectator, and in his opinion con- 
trary to the established course of nature, is taken 
by him to be divine.” Some philosophers like 


132 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Spinoza have argued that “miracle is only an expres- 
sion of our ignorance.” The simplest definition 
seems to be that “when God does anything against 
that order of nature which we know and are accus- 
tomed to observe, we call it a miracle.” A miracle 
is thus a transaction which apparently does not 
conform in all respects with what we regard as 
natural law. We must realize that nowadays differ- 
ent people use the term with entirely different mean- 
ings. One person may mean by the term “miracle” 
a direct interposition of the deity, whilst another 
will understand thereby “an act due to unknown 
intelligent and living agencies operating in a self- 
willed and unpredictable manner; thus effecting 
changes that would not otherwise have occurred, 
and that are not in the regular course of nature.” 
One scientist has well illustrated this by consider- 
ing the case of the “community of an ant-hill, on a 
lonely, uninhabited island, undisturbed for centuries, 
whose dwelling is kicked over one day by a ship- 
wrecked sailor. The ants had reason to suppose 
that events were uniform and all their difficulties 
ancestrally known, it must seem to them an unin- 
telligible miracle.” 

We often use the term “miracle” without being 
aware of its significance. For example, we refer 
to a great work of art as a miracle, meaning thereby 
that it is a wonder. ‘Now wonderfulness is really a 
relative term, for there are mainly two kinds of 
ideas that would be connected with it. It may 


a 


ae 


= wernt : se ae 3 ofere Ng opt Ce Se cae 








JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 133 


suggest impressiveness on account of its novelty or 
variety. This then would refer to the impression 
produced by a scene or object upon the person who 
witnesses it. For example, when the Bible refers to 
the “wonders He hath done,” there seems no hint 
or reference to any disturbance in the natural laws 
of the universe or to any special unprecedented 
event, but merely to the impressive acts of God. 
It is the novelty and unprecedentedness which has 
caused this wonder in Israel. In fact, some philoso- 
phers would argue that the miracle, in the stringent 
sense that is required for such evidential function- 
ing, 1s something which cannot with certainty be 
identified as such. For even if we can definitely 
prove that certain phenomena which have been 
described as miracles actually occurred, this would 
by no means prove that they were ‘miracles.’ 
These marvelous phenomena may cause faith, but 
they are no proof that any-direct divine activity was 
concerned in their production. 

When, therefore, we refer to the wonderfulness of 
a miracle, the most that we can claim for it is that 
it is an event which suggests divine activity, just as 
the success of science suggests that the postulates 
underlying induction are true. 

It has been argued that miracles are impossible 
because they are infringments or interruptions of 
natural law, and as every natural law is unalterably 
fixed and cannot cease to act for one moment, the 
occurrence of the Bible miracles would be contrary 


134 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


to the supposed inviolability of natural law. Now, 
in the first place, we are not at all clear as to what 
is meant by “natural law.” What are natural laws 
if not simply descriptions of our scientific experi- 
ence what Darwin called “the grinding of laws out of 
general instances’? Has not our knowledge of the 
subject of natural law been obtained by contact with 
nature and observation of her secrets? Was it not 
the very natural thing of the falling of an apple 
which led Newton to the discovery of the law of 
gravitation? Our knowledge of natural law is by no 
means fixed and determined, but is subject to 
revision and improvement and must obviously 
become more exact as our knowledge of nature’s 
methods become clearer. It is not so very long ago 
since 1t was considered natural law for the sun to 
revolve round the earth. No law of nature asserts 
categorically that anything must happen, only that 
it will happen if certain conditions continue; and 
that these conditions will continue is in the last 
resort a matter of mere expectation. Common sense 
is apt to confine its practical and psychological certi- 
tude as to the sun’s rising tomorrow with logical 
certainty or necessary truth; but logically there is 
no connection. The true scientist confesses that he 
knows nothing of laws that shall never be broken. 
All that he can argue is that, within certain tracts 
of the universe and for a certain time-interval, laws 
and regularity have been actually found to obtain. 
But when science speaks of laws that shall even per- 








JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 135 


sist until tomorrow, it can only refer to them with 
sanguine expectation. We may argue that miracles 
do not happen, but we certainly have no right to 
say that miracles cannot happen. To argue that 
miracles are impossible because they violate law 
suggests that our knowledge of the universe is much 
vaster than it really is. John Stuart Mill was cer- 
tainly correct when he said that the question con- 
cerning miracles is not a philosophical but a purely 
historical one, and so long as we have no exhaustive 
knowledge of the constitution of nature, the modern 
mind must admit that it cannot assert that a cer- 
tain marvel is beyond the unaided powers of nature. 

We are all agreed that there is no definiteness in a 
law of nature, for it is merely an account of some 
part of nature’s behavior up to date, and is thus 
capable of being revised or superseded. Do we not 
know of events which were incomprehensible in one 
generation being reduced to law in another? One 
of the most recent advances of science—the theory 
of relativity—has made us realize more clearly that 
at best our theories of the universe are only relative, 
according to the truth obtainable by us with our 
limited vision; and apparent discrepancies between 
conclusions in one department of experience and 
another must be considered with the utmost tolera- 
tion. Science thus leaves theology free to assert 
the possibility of miracles. 

But we are told that an “order” is both necessary 
and fatal to miracles, and there are many Jews who, 


136 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


whilst believing in a God, are unwilling to accept 
the miraculous elements of the Bible, often basing 
their arguments on divine immanence, on the restric- 
tion of God’s activity to the fixed order of nature. 
They tell us that God’s immanence is not a matter 
of volition but of necessity. God acts through the 
laws of the universe and we have no evidence that 
He has ever acted in any oth »r way, no right to think 
that He can act in any other way. Many non-Jewish 
theologians have argued in the same way, and we are 
told that “the laws of nature represent the modes 
of action of God Himself, who is the only true cause 
and the only true power, and as He is infinite, 
unchangeably perfect, and perfectly unchangeable, 
His mode of action is therefore constant and uni- 
versal, so that there can be no such thing as a 
violation of God’s constant mode of action.” Surely, 
this form of argument makes the world God’s eter- 
nal prison rather than His eternal dwelling place. 
Professor Mozley was right when, in referring to the 
uniformity of nature, he said:* “The dogma that 
natural laws tells us what always has been, will be 
and must be is not a demonstrable truth, though it 
may be an irresistible belief for many modern minds. 
This belief to many is the outcome of a kind of 
instinctive expectation, but in order to know it as a 
rational principle, we should have to be possessed 
of a full knowledge of the ultimate structure of the 
world—something which science and the modern 


* Bampton Lectures. 








JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 137 


mind cannot claim for the present. Similarly, Sir 
William Crookes has pointed out “if a new fact 
seems to oppose what is called a law of nature, it 
does not prove the asserted fact to be false, but 
only that we have not yet ascertained all the laws of 
nature, or not yet learned them correctly.” 

We are prepared to admit that the question of 
Bible miracles is bound to cause the modern Jew 
some difficulty, but this is not due to the fact that 
the miracles of the Bible exceed the power of God, 
but rather because they seem to us to be out of har- 
mony with the ascertained method of divine action. 
Let us now proceed to consider the question of the 
miracles of the Bible from a specifically Jewish 
standpoint. In the first place we must emphasize 
that to the ancient Hebrews a miracle meant some- 
thing entirely different from what it means to us. 
“The Hebrew mind with its vivid consciousness of 
God’s immediate action in nature did not regard a 
miracle as an unnatural or supernatural event, but 
rather as a striking proof of God’s power and free- 
dom. To the ancient Hebrews, therefore, a miracle 
does not stand as an irregular individual occurrence 
in contrast with a differently ordered whole, but 
rather as a specially striking individual occurrence 
in contrast with other single events, which, being 
less striking owing to their frequency, are less cal- 
culated to produce the impression of God’s almighty 
power in executing His purpose.” We can thus 
understand, for example, that phenomena coinci- 


138 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND. 


dental with a crisis in the nation’s history should 
have been regarded as direct providential inter- 
positions, especially if prayer for deliverance had 
preceded them. Many Rabbis have pointed out 
that the true greatness of a prophet is not to be 
measured by the miracles he performs but by the 
content of his message. Mendelsohn was certainly 
arguing in accordance with the true spirit of Jewish 
thought when he stated that miracles may be 
appealed to in support of every religion and there- 
fore cannot serve as proof of any. In fact, the Rabbis 
argued that whilst the Bible miracles appeared to 
man as something new, in reality they were fore- 
ordained by the creative wisdom. They cannot 
therefore be regarded as interruptions of natural 
law. For example, we read in Aboth (v. 8) of ten 
miraculous objects which were created ‘“‘between the 
suns.” The idea is that these ten things were 
created at the time of transition from “the six days 
of creation to the Sabbath.” The Rabbis could not 
define the relation of these miracles to the course of 
nature to which they wished to assign them, and 
therefore argued that they must have been pre- 
ordained. Again, we are told that when God created 
the world He made an agreement that the sea would 
divide, the fire not hurt, the lions not harm, the fish 
not swallow persons singled out by God, and thus 
the whole order of things changes whenever He finds 
it necessary. 

The attitude of the Talmudic Rabbis toward 





JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 139 


miracles has been often misunderstood, particularly 
by non-Jewish writers, perhaps partly on account of 
the statement in the New Testament (Cor. i. 22): 
“The Jews ask for signs as the Greeks seek for wis- 
dom.” The writer feels, however, that, in this con- 
nection, he cannot do better than quote the words 
of Dr. Schechter, one of the greatest Talmudic 
authorities of the last generation: 


In the whole of Rabbinic literature there is 
not one single instance on record that a Rabbi 
was ever asked by his colleagues to demonstate 
the soundness of his doctrine, or the truth of a 
disputed halachic case, by performing a miracle. 
Only once do we hear of a Rabbi who had 
recourse to miracles for the purpose of showing 
that his conception of a certain Halachah was a 
right one. And in this solitary instance the 
majority declined to accept the miraculous 
intervention as a demonstration of truth and 
decided against the Rabbi who appealed to it. 
Nor, indeed, were such supernatural gifts 
claimed for all Rabbis. Whilst many learned 
Rabbis are said to have ‘“‘been accustomed to 
wonders,” not a single miracle is reported for 
instance of the great Hillel, or his colleague, 
Shammai, both of whom exercised such an 
important influence on Rabbinic Judaism. On 
the other hand, we find that such men as, for 
instance, Choni Hammaagel, whose prayers 
were much sought after in time of drought, or 
R. Chanina b. Dosa, whose prayers were often 


140 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


solicited in cases of illness, left almost no mark 
on Jewish thought, the former being known 
only by the wondrous legends circulating about 
him, the latter being represented in the whole 
Talmud only by one or two moral sayings. 


“Signs” must have been as little required from 
the Jewish Rabbi as from the Greek sophist.’ 


In fact, the Rabbis seemed to find no difficulty in 
rationalizing some of the miraculous narratives of 
the Bible. For example, the account in I Kings 
xv. 3-6 as to Elijah’s having been fed by ravens 
was interpreted in a rationalistic manner and the 
Hebrew word Orebim (ravens) was explained as 
referring to the inhabitants of a town Oreb (Gen. 
R. xxxv. 5; Hul. 5a). It is of interest to note that 
St. Jerome mentions this as a Jewish interpretation 
of the passage, which suggests that it was common 
in his time amongst the people and was not regarded 
as merely the interpretation of certain individual 
Jewish teachers. 

There is another aspect of the problem of miracles 
which cannot be treated fully in the course of these 
pages, but must be taken note of—the symbolism 
of all languages and especially of the Semitic 
languages. We must remember that a careful con- 
sideration of most languages shows that they have 
preserved traces of numerous expressions which rep- 
resent the free development of the imagination, the 


* Some Asnects of Rabbinic Theology, pp. 6-7. 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 141 


original significance of which has disappeared. And 
so we still refer to the treacherous sea, the mad 
wind, the rising sun, etc. It has been pointed out 
that all language is poetry. It may not be poetry 
m esse but it is always potential verse, for there 
is undoubtedly a rhythm in language to which the 
mind and feelings immediately respond, just as there 
is a natural rhythm in the beating of the heart, the 
drawing of the breath, and in many movements of 
the body. Language has therefore been described 
as a “fossil poetry.” In other words, we are not to 
look for the poetry which a people may possess only 
in its poems or its poetical customs, traditions, and 
beliefs. Many a single word also is itself a con- 
centrated poem, having stores of poetical thought 
and imagery laid upon it. If we bear this in mind, 
and remember also that scholars are generally agreed 
that the key to a profound understanding and faith- 
ful explanation of the ancient Oriental world is 
hidden in a mysterious system of symbolism which 
is still exceedingly difficult to interpret, we will 
realize how unnecessary it is for us to regard as 
prose and literally many miraculous narratives of 
the Bible which were probably never intended to 
represent anything but poetical and symbolical 
accounts of certain events. 

In this connection, we may point out that many 
scholars now agree that quite a number of the sym- 
bolical actions of the prophets, particularly those 
which appear to be miraculous, were not actually 


142 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


performed in their literal sense, but were conceived 
as symbolic visions.” For example, in the fourth 
chapter of Ezekiel we are told that the prophet lay 
upon his side for three hundred and ninety days. 
How can this be taken literally? In the same chapter 
we are also told of other extraordinary actions of his. 
Surely it cannot reasonably be suggested that the 
prophet would have inconvenienced himself by going 
to such extremes, merely in order to bring home to 
the people some divine message which he could very 
well have preached in a much more suitable manner? 
For these and many other reasons the symbolisms 
of the Book of Ezekiel which are not definitely stated 
to have been performed are regarded as merely a 
kind of meshalim, or parables centering round the 
prophet as the representative of Israel. 

There are two instances, particularly, where 
hyperbolical or poetical language of the Bible seems 
to have been hardened into concrete fact, namely, 
the narrative which describes the standing still of 
the sun at Joshua’s behest and the whole account 
contained in the Book of Jonah. Let us proceed to 
consider these in detail. 

In the account of the conquest of Western Pales- 
tine there is a poetical passage addressed by Joshua 
to the sun and moon (Josh. x. 12, 13). The people 
of Gibeon were besieged by Amorites and they sent 
to Joshua for help. Joshua came up by night and 
took the Amorites by surprise, chased them over the 


* Farbridge, Studies in Biblical Symbolism, p. 12 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 143 


central range to its western slopes. Then spake 
Joshua to JHVH and in the face of Israel said: 


O Sun, on Gibeon be thou still, 

And Moon, on the vale of Ayyalon. 

The Sun is still, and the Moon hath stood, 
Till the folk be avenged on their foes. 


Both these couplets are given in the Bible as “writ- 
ten in the Book of Yashar.” The second passage 
from this couplet has been the subject of much diffi- 
eulty seeing that it has been usually translated in 
the past tense, “and the Sun was still and the Moon 
did stand.” Such a translation causes much diffi- 
culty and the miracle has been the subject of con- 
siderable discussion. The rendering as given above 
by a distinguished Hebrew scholar is perhaps the 
most plausible. “It is part of the poem, but in 
Joshua’s mouth at the very moment he has uttered 
the prayer; its verbs must be understood not in 
the past but in the present, as is rendered above. 
The fragment, then, is a prayer, and the confident 
expression of its fulfillment—a prayer for the day 
to last long enough for the full rout of Israel’s 
EOeS 41; 

As an instance of one of the biblical books the 
miraculous elements of which have caused consider- 
able difficulty to many Jews, but which can easily 
be understood by a symbolical interpretation, we 


*G. A. Smith, The Early Poetry of Israel, Schweich Lectures, 
pp. 79f. This is, of course, but one of a number of explanations 
which seem plausible. 


144 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


might consider the Book of Jonah. We find so many 
wonders accumulated in the compass of this narra- 
tive and the supernatural element enters into the 
contents of this book in so unusual a degree, that 
the story has caused much difficulty to many 
readers; but though the book has been the cause of 
much jest to the mocker and considerable bewilder- 
ment to the literalist, to the Jew who reads his Bible 
carefully and attempts to understand its inner spirit 
it is the cause of considerable pleasure. 

The reader who treats the story literally as a 
record of actual happenings feels it is all passing 
strange. He isin wonderland and is confronted with 
difficulties at every step. We are told that a true 
prophet should disobey a direct divine command and 
that the Almighty should cause many innocent per- 
sons to suffer by sending a storm in order to pursue 
a single person, and above all that Jonah should 
have remained in the fish for three days and three 
nights, exceeds human credibility. But once we 
place the story into the category to which it prob- 
ably belongs, and regard it not as the record of 
actual historical events but as a symbolic narrative, 
we can enjoy its beauty and submit to its teaching 
of a truth which is as vital and as necessary today 
as it was when first told. 

The author of the book had a great lesson to teach, 
a universal truth which he wished to emphasize to 
the nations as well as to Israel. The great prophets 
of Israel had been teaching that as JHVH is the only 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 145 


God that exists, He is the God of all the nations of 
the world as well as of Israel, and that His love 
goes out to them all as well as to Israel. Whilst He 
punishes sin wherever He finds it, He does not desire 
the death of a sinner, but rather that he repent and 
live. If mankind continues to take no heed of God 
inevitable punishment will befall it, and therefore 
all nations are called upon to return to God and be 
saved. It was certainly a fine prophetic conception 
and a glorious doctrine. But the Jews had been 
cruelly treated by the great world powers and as a 
result had become narrow and embittered. Various 
questions perplexed them. Why does JHVH, the 
God of righteousness, delay His punishment against 
the heathen? Why does He not interfere on their 
behalf and vindicate Himself? This was the cry of 
the Jewish people as the passion in their hearts 
grew stronger and their hatred of the heathen grew 
fiercer. 

Nevertheless, there were still living in a Hebrew 
soul the profoundly religious instincts of some of 
the great prophets of Israel, with their idea of JHVH 
as the one God of the whole world and their hope 
that Israel would be the great missionary of man- 
kind by bringing its knowledge of the true God to 
all the nations of the earth. This great teacher, 
particularly, felt himself inspired to emphasize this 
doctrine. But how could he summon Israel to her 
great cause? He felt that his words would be more 
effective if he used the symbolical method as a mode 


146 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


of argument. Taking Jonah as his hero, for the 
name (Dove) had become a symbolic name for 
Israel, the prophet is described as hastening to the 
port of Joppa. He had been told to preach the 
doctrine of repentance to the gentile world, but 
his unloving exclusiveness and narrow-mindedness 
causes him to relinquish his office in the service of 
God rather than be an instrument of blessing to a 
heathen nation. 

As he gets on board a vessel after his journey he 
sinks into the wearied sleep of the traveler. The 
storm rises; the Tyrian sailors are all astir with 
terror and activity. The stranger unknown to them 
is attacked with numerous questions. Why hath 
this happened? What doest thou? Whence are 
thou? What is thy country? Of what people art 
thou? Higher and higher the sea seems to surge till 
at last the victim 1s thrown in and its rage ceases. He 
is swallowed by one of the huge monsters of the 
sea and vanishes from view for three long days and 
nights. Then comes his hymn of thanksgiving. 

A new scene now presents itself. Nineveh, the 
great city of Assyria, rises before us. Within its 
vast circumference are included royal palaces and 
crowded marts and gardens and vineyards. The 
Hebrew stranger enters its precincts, crying, “Yet 
forty days and then Nineveh shall be overthrown.” 
Suddenly the scene changes again and Nineveh 
becomes one vast temple of penitence and prayer. 
Business and pleasure cease and lamentation and 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 147 


mourning is heard throughout the land. Even the 
animals are included in this universal humiliation. 
Everyone in Nineveh has repented of his evil ways. 
Their prayers have been heard, and instead of the 
cloud which hung threateningly over the city there 
shines forth again upon it the sun of prosperity. 
“And God saw their works, that they turned from 
their evil ways, and God repented of the evil that 
he had said that he would do unto them and He did 
PeEROt. * 

But this prophet, who had desired to see more 
“than six score thousand persons that cannot discern 
between their right hand and their left’ destroyed 
because of his preconceived notions of the necessities 
of a logical theory, is greatly displeased at the 
clemency of God toward Nineveh, and he confesses 
that it was the expectation that that clemency would 
be exercised which rendered him unwilling to under- 
take the divine mission at first. And now another 
scene appears before our eyes. Jonah is enjoying 
shelter from the burning rays of the sun by a wide- 
spreading plant which covers his booth with its 
refreshing shade. But suddenly the plant is 
attacked by insects. Its protecting leaves are 
destroyed and the rays of the sun pour down on 
his defenseless head. The prophet therefore again 
complains. And God now replies, saying, “Thou 
hadst pity on a short-lived plant which cost thee 
naught and thou art angry even unto death for its 
loss. Shall not I, the Lord of mankind, have mercy 


148 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


upon a city including six score thousand inno- 
cent children who are incapable of moral discrimina- 
tion?” 

We now appreciate the great religious doctrine 
taught by the book. “It is the rare protest of 
theology against the excess of theology. It is the 
faithful delineation, through all its various states of 
the dark, sinister, selfish side of even great religious 
teachers. It is the grand biblical appeal to the com- 
mon instincts of humanity and to the universal 
love of God against the narrow dogmatism of sec- 
tarian polemics.” We thus understand why the 
book is read on the most sacred day of the Jewish 
calendar. It is not to encourage credulity or belief 
in the miraculous but to emphasize to us on the 
great Day of Atonement that man is not a curse- 
laden creature, groaning under the yoke of original 
sin. But all of us—Jew and Gentile alike—are 
bidden to examine our conduct and confess our fail- 
ings and we shall find that within us alone lies the 
source of our misery, and true repentance is the only 
means by which reconciliation can be brought 
between the sin-laden mortal and his Maker. 

Some of us feel that we can even see in this 
story of a storm-tossed prophet, amid the threaten- 
ing crew, a symbolic representation of Israel the 
wanderer. Having left his homeland, embarking 
upon the treacherous tide and committing himself 
into the hands of strangers who make him respon- 
sible for their misfortunes, he is cast to the mercy of 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 149 


the pitiless waves. The questions hurled at the 
prophet, “What is thine occupation and whence 
comest thou?” “What is thy country and of what 
people art thou?” are the questions which have been 
hurled at us by all peoples in all lands, and our one 
reply has been, ‘‘I am a Hebrew.” 

When anti-Semitic scholars refer to the avai! 
ance of the God of Israel, let us remind them that 
the great doctrine of the boundless power of human 
repentance, which is the basis of true religion today, 
received its first illustration from the Bible—from 
the repentance of the people of Nineveh at the 
preaching of Jonah. 

Finally, in the discussion of the possible inter- 
pretations of the miracles of the Bible, we ought to 
refer to the advance in medical science which causes 
us to interpret differently some of the healing nar- 
ratives of the Bible. Whilst it is not our intention ~ 
to attempt to prove in the course of this work that 
any given cases of healing in the Bible have their 
parallel in recent developments in medical science, 
there seems little doubt that some of the Elijah and 
Elisha stories, for example, suggest the employment 
of these methods. 

The great advance in the science of psycho- 
analysis, for which we are primarily indebted to 
Professor Freud of Vienna, has revolutionized our 
modern theory of neuroses. And the last war, which 
stimulated the practice of psychotherapy and 
brought to our hospitals a considerable number of 


150 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


patients suffering from shell-shock and various war- 
neuroses, increased very considerably our knowl- 
edge of the methods of this form of treatment. 
Without, however, entering into a discussion of the 
conflicting views of psychoanalysts, one can safely 
say that, although few medical men would prob- 
ably profess themselves to be whole-hearted fol- 
lowers of Freud, there are few that would not admit 
that they owe much to his teachings. Another 
science worthy of mention in this connection is 
autosuggestion, and we may note further that, apart 
from specific examples, even the little knowledge 
that we have of the powers of suggestion would lead 
us to believe that many skin diseases can be at least 
mitigated by this agency. We know that suggestion 
is capable of influencing the blood supply and also 
of abolishing pain; whilst Professor Baudouin, in 
his work Suggestion and Autosuggestion, writes: 
“We have to note that there is no radical difference 
between the action of suggestion when its results are 
purely functional and its action when its results are 
organic. If we admit that suggestion can act in the 
former cases (and this has long been admitted) 
there need be no difficulty about acknowledging the 
reality of its action in the latter case.” 

As to the possibilities of the treatment of disease 
by means of hypnotic suggestion, we might quote 
the words of a distinguished authority on the sub- 
ject: “When we know more about hypnotic sugges- 
tion, and have attained a greater skill in inducing it 
in a larger proportion of patients, we may be able 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 151 


to affect for good any organic inflammatory con- 
dition, whether medical or surgical, both by regu- 
lating the blood supply and also by the abolition of 
pain.” * | 

We thus see that the explanations that can be 
offered for the miracles of the Bible are perhaps as 
varied as the miracles themselves. And in approach- 
ing the whole subject of miracles we feel, therefore, 
that we must first rid our minds of the a priori dog- 
matic prejudice in this connection and most of our 
difficulties will disappear. But whilst we note that 
some of the Bible miracles may be explained as 
being poetical or symbolical interpretations of cer- 
tain occurrences, others again as “natural events” 
which are quite comprehensible in the light of 
modern scientific investigation, and some, it has 
been suggested, possibly as popular narratives which 
may have gradually clustered around the lives of 
these prophets, there are many of us who feel that 
we must protest with ourselves at the dry-as-dust 
program of science, the tendency of research, all 
of which seems to be in favor of nil admirari, and 
we are reminded of Keats’ lines: 


Do not all charms fly 

At the mere touch of cold philosophy? 
There was an awful rainbow once in heaven: 
We know her woof, her texture; she is given 
In the dull catalogue of common things. 


~ &See article by Dr. Hadfield, “The Influence of Hypnotic 
Suggestion on Inflammatory Conditions,” The Lancet, Nov. 3, 
1917. 


152° JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


We remember how Aristotle, in the Ethics, speak- 
ing of his “magnanimous man,” says that “he is not 
apt to admire, for nothing is great to him.’ Never- 
theless, the sense of wonder still exists in man and 
science has been unable to sweep the universe clean 
of the old elements on which wonder feeds. No 
scientific explanations, no cosmic theories, can take 
away the essential marvel of things as they are. 
When we account for the world by tracing all back 
to one original, revolving fire mist, condensing into 
planets and evolving in succession atmosphere, 
rocks, soil, water, plants, animals, and finally man, 
“Why,” we must ask, “did the original motion work 
along these out of all possible lines, and what was 
there in the first impulsion that could produce 
effects? How did this blind force contrive to endow 
us with souls and sympathy and religion? Truly, 
the miracle of man, as conceived by the Hebrew cos- 
mogonists is nothing as compared with the miracle 
of man as conceived by some scientists. 

We see atoms, ions, and electrons, invisibly small 
and seemingly meaningless, display such wonderful 
likes and dislikes to and of each other, execute such 
complicated and wise movements in order to form 
larger and higher combinations of matter up to the 
organization of plants and animals, that we cannot 
help regarding this as miraculous. The naturalist 
cannot tell us how all this original mass of matter 
was first set in motion, but the scientist who leaves 
the domain of scientific investigation, and enters 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 153 


that of philosophy, finds his solution in the theism of 
the Bible. It is God who has planned everything, 
and the interplay of natural forces, chemical affinity 
and gravitation, attraction and repulsion, are but 
the expression of His thoughts and a form of His 
will. 

The theism of the Bible is thus the highest con- 
ception of God we have, for it teaches us concern- 
ing a God who is the cause of all activity in the 
natural forces of the universe, and who at the same 
time is free to make use of these forces at His 
pleasure for higher purposes of being. Surely the 
God of infinite resources cannot be confined to our 
mode of action, or prevented from changing the 
manner of His doings, if thereby He wills to bring 
to pass something of paramount importance. We 
thus see that it iy not that Judaism presupposes 
miracles: rather do they presuppose the theistic 
philosophy of the Jew. 

But we may ask how is our belief in miracles 
affected by the beliefs in the miraculous of other 
peoples and creeds. Let us consider this question 
in greater detail. Amongst primitive peoples there 
is a belief that the medicine man, or shaman, has 
the power to alter certain concrete events. Frazer ° 
has pointed out that to primitive man the whole 
order of nature is elastic. It is elastic to the 
magician just as it is elastic to the divinity. The 
savage himself can alter events by means of the 


° Balder the Beautiful. 


154 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


fetish; whilst the medicine man can do so by means 
of the magical power which he possesses. ‘This 
magical force, by means of which rain and sunshine 
can be produced or stopped, sickness cured, and the 
fertility of the soil increased, is mysterious to prim- 
itive man, and everything that is mysterious is 
miraculous. We think of the religions of all peoples 
—ancient and modern—whose history is full of the 
miraculous, the hills and dales, the brooks and the 
rivers, which are peopled with Gods, and of the 
events taking place there as the outcome of their 
wisdom and power. Even now we hear of excur- 
sions and pilgrimages being made to certain spots 
where the sick have been healed and various forms 
of cures effected, and we recall that violent dis- 
turbances in nature, such as cyclones, volcanic erup- 
tions, and earthquakes, have all engendered the 
belief in a higher power. We are thus tempted to 
ask, “What is our attitude toward the miracles of 
all these different beliefs and creeds? Professor 
W. A. Brown has very beautifully replied to this by 
showing how the miracle-beliefs of all races are the 
means of strengthening our faith in God, for they 
testify man’s refusal throughout the ages to regard 
Himself as alone in the Universe: 


After the simple faith of childhood has been 
banished by life’s disillusioning experiences, the 
human soul longs for some refuge from which it 
cannot be dislodged, some guarantee that the 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 155 


sacred purpose to which its life has been con- 
secrated is rooted in the Eternal; and in 
miracles man feels that his own resources have 
been enlarged. Whether it is the burning fire 
or the still small voice is of little consequence, 
for what matters is that there has suddenly 
appeared before our eyes a new form of energy 
and vitality, which has lifted him above the 
limitations of his narrow sphere of activity, and 
has reinforced his limited vitality and power. 
Man has suddenly been brought face to face 
with God and by His intervention has realized 
the greatness of the Divine.‘ 


Whilst, therefore, many of us may not be prepared 
to accept a purely literal interpretation of many 
of the miraculous narratives of the Bible, we are 
by no means willing to give up our belief in miracles 
generally. 

Furthermore, a comparison of biblical history 
with the religious literatures of other peoples 
strengthens our claim for the belief in the miraculous 
in the history of Israel. We feel that the dogmatism 
which regards miracles as incredible and attempts to 
exclude them from the historical records of the his- 
tory of Israel leaves the whole biblical narrative so 
incoherent and unconvincing as to be capable of any 
kind of arbitrary explanation. For at least some of 
the miracles of the Bible differ entirely from the 
miracles of other peoples. They do not center 


* Harvard Theological Review, July, 1915, p. 341. 


156 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


round the life or personality of any particular 
individual; nor are they the doings of caprice as 
found in the religions and mythologies of other races. 
The omnipresent God so acts everywhere in nature 
that its stability is assured. The course of its 
unalterable laws are only broken at times in order 
to hasten the development of individuals and the 
progress of humanity. It is this which accounts for 
God’s choice of Israel as the vehicle of His thoughts. 
The very appearance of Israel as His people thus 
called for the manifestation of special power and 
direction. The true God had to be made known and 
the confidence of Israel in Him had to be elicited 
and confirmed. It was only natural, therefore, that 
miracles should take place and wonderful occur- 
rences be enacted. Every Jew will thus be prepared 
to agree that miracles accompanied the most 
momentous creative acts of God, such as the giving 
of the Torah and that which brought into being the 
nationality of Israel. 

To the Jew who feels that belief in revelation is 
not only possible, but an essential part of his faith, 
there are two means of affording such revelation: 
an immediate revelation to each individual, or else 
a commission given by God to certain persons, 
accompanied by indisputable credentials of their 
being actually delegated by Him to make known 
His will. The former method would obviously be 
ineffectual, for either God must so powerfully 
influence the minds and affections of men as to 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 157 


destroy the freedom of their will, or else it would 
fill the world with continual impostures and delu- 
sions from the various and contradictory pretences 
to revelations to which it would give rise. The latter 
method as taught by the Bible and Jewish philoso- 
phy is thus the most eligible as well as the most 
satisfactory. 

The miracles of the Bible are thus not isolated 
physical phenomena or prodigies. They have a 
moral and spiritual sequence. We are agreed that 
science can investigate certain physical phenomena. 
It may even produce modifications in these, but it 
cannot explain the process. For example, it cannot 
explain why precisely a certain combination or 
arrangement of forces or conditions produces elec- 
tricity. In fact, the whole process cannot be 
described as the creation of electricity, but merely 
the setting in motion of certain forces already 
possessing electrical.power. Similarly, many of the 
miracles of the Bible have a clear relation to sur- 
rounding circumstances. They are distinct revela- 
tions of God or of God’s nature in relation to the 
universe and man. His miracles are not for the pur- 
pose of rectifying His own mistakes, but are 
intended in this evil and disordered world as a pub- 
lic manifestation—much more effective than the 
more quietly working process—of the way in which 
everything is gradually being worked to the highest 
stage of perfection. 

The power of God is such that He can act excep- 


158 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


tionally under exceptional circumstances. There is 
no childish love of the marvelous: in fact, we have 
every justification for seeing considerable reserve in 
the exhibition of the miraculous in the Bible, but 
when necessity arises God, whose power is not 
limited to natural law or to the uniformity of cus. 
tom, innovates upon the normal physical order. 
But all these variations of natural law are never 
intended for any pure exhibition of power. It is 
the means by which God works in the interest of 
the moral order of the universe and the method 
by which He shows His protest against the mon- 
strous disorder of sin. 

It is to be regretted that so many Jewish theo- 
logians have been attempting in recent years to 
eliminate the miraculous entirely from Jewish his- 
tory. We are prepared to agree with those theo- 
logians who emphasize the immanence of God and 
argue that all events are supernatural since all are 
produced by or are particular expressions of the 
immanent God. But we cannot help pointing out 
that we are also in danger of so impoverishing the 
idea of God that its value as a religious conception 
is reduced to a minimum. True, God is immanent 
in the world; He is no far-off deity, separate from 
His works. Not a single thing that happens is inde- 
pendent of Him, but that does not mean that He is 
identical with the world or limited by it. He is 
present in the world, not because He is identical 
with it, but because He is Master of it; the universe 


JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 159 


is pervaded and enveloped by the mystery of His 
will. We cannot accept the almost deistic view that 
God’s eternal plan has been achieved and His crea- 
tive activity exhausted, so that He is now a mere 
spectator and the world a God-forsaken machine. 

The boundless complexity of His universe should 
never allow us to conceal the simple fact of His 
own personality. A deity conceived in the way 
some of our present-day theologians suggest could 
never provide comfort to the oppressed soul, for if 
God is but a name for the totality of things, then 
when we possess Him we possess nothing that we 
did not have before. We cannot appeal to God 
when the world treats us ill, for we have already 
had our God. But our God is not the God of hill 
or dale, cloud or sunshine, life or death, nor is God 
another name for the totality of existing things, but 
a free and living force. We feel that we can appeal 
from nature to nature’s God, and therefore if we are 
to have implicit faith in Him we must believe that 
He can work miracles. 

It is of interest to note that many Jewish scholars 
who are constantly emphasizing that they cannot 
accept any of the miracles of the Bible usually 
emphasize the importance of prophetism in Israel 
and argue that it was due to the influence of the 
“personality” of the prophets that Israel’s religion 
owed its persistent vigor, its perpetual upward 
tendency and the growing purity and loftiness of its 
fundamental conceptions. But what is “per- 


160 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


sonality”? In spite of all our advances in psy- 
chology we have not yet succeeded in fathoming its 
abysmal depths. Whether we say that the prophetic 
genius of these leaders of Israel was due to a 
“superabundance of energy and enthusiasm, and 
overwhelming personality,” or to a “prophetic 
instinct,” we are by no means nearer an explanation 
of these terms. We must remember that prophetic 
enthusiasm is something more than mere energy. 
It is energy conscious of a potential difference. We 
are told by psychologists that ‘‘freedom and creation 
constitute the secret of personality, and these again 
are caused by a devotion to an attraction for and 
emancipation from natural and accidental termina- 
tion toward logical truth and correctness, which 
arises from the deeper spiritual levels of our being.” 
But how are we to explain all the forces which act 
in this way upon certain men? There seems to be 
one explanation and one only. 


The evidence for miracles is the same as that 
which leads us to believe in personality in any 
form, whether in ourselves, in others, or in the 
great Unseen Spirit at the heart of things, 
whose nature we are constrained to believe is 
in some true sense akin to ours. So long as we 
believe in persons anywhere, or for any reason, 
we shall continue to believe in miracles, for by 
a person we mean essentially a miracle-worker. 
Personality means initiative, enterprise, but at 
the same time interpretation and fellowship, A 





JUDAISM AND MIRACLES 161 


person is a being who is able not simply to bring 
new things to pass, but at the same time, to 
make the new he does or inspires the bond that 
links him to some kindred spirit. And the con- 
tact that unites these two poles of the life of 
spirit and fuses them into a single experience is 
miracle. So stated, miracle is a part of the 
larger question of theism, and in the last resort, 
stands or falls with it. If you could disprove 
the existence of a personal God, you would dis- 
prove miracles. So long as faith in such a God 
exists, miracle will remain, for miracle is the 
way in which the personal God communicates 
His will to man. 


“Every great personality,” says Professor Har- 
nack, “reveals a part of what it is only when seen 
in those it influences. The more powerful a per- 
sonality a man possesses, and the more he takes hold 
of the inner life of others, the less can the sum total 
of what he is be known by what he says himself and 
does.” 

But, furthermore, as we Jews contemplate our 
past, and the contributions which we, as a people, 
have made toward the forward progress of 
humanity, as we consider many of the “incredible 
events” of the history of our people in the setting 
in which they occurred and the consequences which 
followed from them, we find ourselves almost liter- 
ally compelled to describe them as miracles. As 
Jews whose whole history is stranger than fiction, 


162 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


and who have witnessed the hand of God working 
amongst us throughout the ages, we cannot help 
feeling that there is no reason for us to question the 
Bible narrative, for example, that God did lead 
His people with a mighty hand and with an out- 
stretched arm and with signs and wonders (Deut. 
xxvl. 8). 

But whether we are prepared to accept the literal 
accounts of certain Bible miracles or not, we must 
always bear in mind that the real miracle of the 
Bible lies elsewhere than in the accounts of separate 
miraculous performances. It is to be found in the 
strong sense of divine presence in the world and 
divine guidance in the affairs of the universe, in the 
records of spiritual experience and aspiration, in the 
great phenomena of prophetism, and in the develop- 
ment of a spiritual religion which is the basis of 
our modern faith. 





Forget not that we live in an historical age, in which 
everybody must show his credentials from the past. The 
Bible is our patent of nobility granted to us by the 
Almighty God, and if we disown the Bible, leaving it to 
the tender mercies of a Wellhausen, Stade and Duhm and 
other beautiful souls working away at diminishing the 
“nimbus of the chosen people” the world will disown us. 


ScHEcHTER: Seminary Addresses. 


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CHAPTER V 


JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 


Various types of Biblical criticism—Lower criticism—Higher criti- 
cism—Traditional Judaism and the higher criticism—Higher 
criticism and archeology—Differences of style no criterion as 
to different authorship—Schechter and the higher criticism— 
Tradition has in itself a scientific value and does not neces- 
sarily mean the opposite of scientific criticism—Genius cannot 
exist without some possibility of social appreciation—The 
unity of the Pentateuch. 


Let us now proceed to consider the question of 
biblical criticism and its influence on traditional 
Jewish thought. Many of us who have been brought 
up in traditional Jewish homes no doubt resent the 
attitude toward the Bible adopted by the new 
- schools of critical scholars. We have been taught 
from childhood to regard the Bible as a divinely 
inspired literature, which reached, roughly speak- 
ing, from the time of Moses down to the time of 
Malachi in the fifth century of the common era. 
Within that period we had at the outset the Penta- 
teuch written by Moses, the historical books com- 
piled by those who followed him, the Psalter very 
largely composed by David, Proverbs from the pen 
of Solomon, and various prophetic books written by 

165 


166 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


the authors whose names they bear. It probably 
never occurred to us that there might be any doubt 
whatever attached either to the traditional author- 
ship of the books or to the statements which they 
enshrine. But whilst we have been cherishing these 
views, scholars in Europe and America have been at 
work upon the literature of the Bible, challenging all 
the ancient traditions and attempting to destroy 
many of the sacred beliefs of our childhood days. 
We have heard of Colenso, Robertson Smith, and 
Wellhausen, and we have noted how the higher 
critical school has been attracting many scholars to 
its banner. The criticism of the Bible by modern 
scholars today may be divided into three classes. 
First there is the criticism which seeks to determine 
the exact text of its author. This is called textual 
criticism or Lower Criticism, not because it is an 
inferior type of criticism nor yet because it demands 
less intellectual power or technical skill on the part 
of those who practice it, but because it deals with 
the primary part of the subject. We cannot satis- 
factorily investigate our documents till we have 
convinced ourselves of the accuracy of their text. 
When we turn to the Bible we find that the 
different Hebrew manuscripts, preserve essentially 
the same text throughout. This is because the 
divergent readings have largely been suppressed and 
a standard text has been formed so that the various 
readings which would have been so valuable in 
helping us by comparison to work back to the 





JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 167 


original text have been almost entirely obliterated. 
It is fortunate that we have certain translations, 
notably that into Greek known as the Septuagint, 
which at times assist us in understanding the mean- 
ing of the Hebrew text. Yet since this translation 
was itself made only shortly before the common era, 
through the many centuries that in some instances 
elapsed between the original composition of a book | 
and its translation, there was abundant time for 
numerous corruptions to come into the text and, 
therefore, for a great deal of uncertainty to attach 
to what an author originally wrote. Nevertheless, 
one need not be disheartened by this. Although the 
text in detail is frequently uncertsin, still in the 
main we may say that the text of the Bible is toler- 
ably well preserved to us, and if we are content with 
not demanding too much, we can read it with a 
very fair reliance that on the whole we are really 
in touch with what the authors actually wrote. 
Matters become more revolutionary when we pass 
from the lower to the higher criticism, which deals 
with the question of authorship and structure of the 
books. Now many non-Jewish scholars do not 
accept the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch and 
regard it as consisting of four main documents each 
of which, according to them, has a history behind it. 
The earliest of these they assign to the eighth or 
ninth centuries B.c.ze. These are the most interest- 
ing and fascinating parts of the Pentateuch; they 
contain those stories which charmed us by their 


168 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


romance and beauty when we were children and still 
cast their literary and spiritual spell upon us now 
that we have come to riper years. Next, the later 
document which forms the nucleus of the present 
Book of Deuteronomy is assigned to a date either 
in the reign of Manasseh or that of Josiah and is 
identified with the Book of the law which was dis- 
covered by Hilkiah in the Temple and formed the 
basis of the great reformation inaugurated by Josiah. 
And then, finally, the great section commonly known 
as the Priestly Document, which contains the 
greater part of the legislation of Israel, the docu- 
ment which embraces not a little of Genesis and 
Exodus, of Numbers and Joshua, together with the 
whole of Leviticus, while including some historical 
narratives, is, for the most part, concerned in laying 
down the ecclesiastical constitution under which the 
Hebrews lived. This document, after prolonged dis- 
cussion among critics, has now been fixed to a period 
after the time of Ezekiel, on whose legislation in the 
last nine chapters it 1s supposed to rest, and it is 
roughly dated about 500 B.c.z. 

We are now tempted to ask how far traditional 
Judaism is in accord with the results of higher 
criticism. To this we have two replies. In the first 
place, we believe traditional Judaism to be entirely 
independent of the results of higher criticism. We 
must emphasize that Judaism has two foundations 
—the Talmud in addition to the Bible—and, as we 
shall see later in our discussion on Jewish tradition, 


JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 169 


the roots of Judaism are driven too far into the core 
of Jewish life as it has been lived for generations for 
it to be affected by any new theory as to the struc- 
ture of one of its foundations. But furthermore, 
whilst it may perhaps be legitimate for a student 
to accept some of the latest theories of higher criti- 
cism as working hypotheses in his biblical studies, 
they do not affect in any way our attachment to 
traditional Judaism, for these theories are by no 
means final and to many of us absolutely unaccept- 
able. 

We must bear in mind that expert opinion cannot 
always be accepted implicitly. It is true that the 
influence of the higher critics is keenly felt in all 
high places and most of our modern commentaries 
on the Bible are written by them. But we ought not 
to forget the numerous scholars of distinction who 
have most skilfully championed the authenticity of 
the Bible and who are beginning to make them- 
selves felt against the very powerful opposition with 
which they have to meet. 

The higher critics have no right to assume the 
attitude that one who does not accept their views 
is hopelessly out of date, for many of their dog- 
matic assertions have been discredited by arche- 
ological research. In fact, some of the leading 
Oriental archeologists such as Sayce, Hommel, and 
Halévy did not accept the “settled” results of the 
higher critical school. 

It used to be argued that so extended a literary 


170 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


production as the Pentateuch at the very rise of the 
people of Israel is not believable and points much 
more to a time when the arts of reading and writing 
were widely diffused. Recent archeological discoy- 
erles have shown, however, how utterly valueless 
this argument is against the authenticity of the 
Pentateuch. For during the last century, particu- 
larly, there have been discovered in Babylonia huge 
libraries containing thousands of clay tablets of 
historical material produced long before the Hebrews 
left Egypt. 

But apart from the views of the leading arch- 
eologists one ought to refer also to the works of 
such scholars as Eerdmans, the successor of Kuenen 
at the University of Leyden, and Harold M. 
Wiener, a Jewish scholar whose knowledge of law 
has proved him of service in pointing out the reck- 
less statements of the critics on the legal portions of 
the Pentateuch. As far back as 1879 Dr. David 
Hoffman of the Rabbinical Seminary at Berlin 
began to subject the theories of Hellhausen to a 
critical examination and showed many of their weak- 
nesses. These are embodied in his later work pub- 
lished in 1904. 

The erroneous conclusions of the critics are due 
in most instances to the fact that, although many of 
them are undoubtedly excellent scholars, they do 
not possess the first-hand knowledge of the arch- 
eologists. As a result they approach the Bible with 
Western minds and from an Occidental standpoint, 


JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 171 


and the views which they put forward to explain 
many difficulties and apparent discrepancies in Old 
Testament literature are thus based on a conception 
of law and literature which is essentially Western 
and which is fundamentally wrong when applied to 
a Semitic people like the Hebrews. For example, 
the differences of style which exists in the Penta- 
teuch are no criteria whatever as to differences of 
authorship such as the higher critics seem to infer. 
Wiener rightly points out that if the Indian Penal 
Code which was drafted by Macaulay were con- 
trasted with some of his speeches and ballads 
similar divergencies of vocabulary and rhythm will 
at once become apparent. Surely, it is only to be 
expected that Moses should have used a different 
style in delivering an exhortation to the people to 
be loyal and faithful to their religious principles 
from that used when dealing with laws of sacrifice. 
There are so many classical and modern writers 
whose works show differences of style and presum- 
ably, therefore, differences of authorship, although 
we have every evidence to the contrary, that we can- 
not help feeling how preposterous is this argument 
of differences of style when applied as a means of 
analyzing the Pentateuch into various documents. 
We may imagine a school of critics in 3000 c.z. 
who, directing their attention to the writings of 
Milton, will conclude that the same hand is not 
seen in “Paradise Lost,” “The Lycidas’” and “Para- 
dise Regained.” ‘They may point out the dramatic 


172 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


force and creative imagination of the “Paradise 
Lost” which seems to be lacking in the “Paradise 
Regained.” They may point out how different 
appears the tone of “Lycidas” from either of them. 
And yet the name on the title page showing an 
unbroken tradition will outweigh all such opinions. 
It is interesting to note also that the commentaries 
on the Gallic War (50 B.c.n.) attributed to Caesar 
are written throughout in the third person. It is 
only the title that indicates its author. In fact, in 
the fifth century, two classical writers (Sidonius and 
Orosius) only knew the work by its title and, curi- 
ously enough, they mistook it to be commentaries on 
Caesar’s Gallic War written by Suetonius. The 
MS. is a register of contemporaneous tradition and 
the strongest evidence for us is that the book has 
come down to us as the commentaries of Julius 
Caesar. Another example is a work of the Roman 
historian Tacitus, Dialogus de Oratoribus which dif- 
fers in style and mood from his other writings and 
is lacking in his later bitterness. This has caused 
many scholars to regard Pliny the younger, Sue- 
tonius and Quintillian as its author. But, on the 
whole, there is hardly anyone whom we might 
credit with sufficient talent and character to be the 
author of the Dialogus, and there is now a general 
agreement that Tacitus wrote the book, for which 
the title of the Ms. as a register of contemporaneous 
tradition is the strongest evidence. 

Again, in our attempts to probe the meaning 


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JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 173 


of the Bible we must not forget that its language is 
to a great extent the language of poetry and 
imagination and not that of science and legal pre- 
cision. Centuries elapsed between the time that 
Hebrew was a spoken language and its recent 
revival, and we are therefore frequently confronted 
with difficulties in our efforts to understand the true 
meaning of a Hebrew idiom. This explains why 
many Rabbinical interpretations which to us seem 
so unnatural and fanciful were regarded by our 
ancestors as quite consistent and in perfect harmony 
with the meaning of the Hebrew text. 

Nor can we accept the usage of the divine names 
in the Pentateuch as a means of separating the text 
into various documents. A new school of scholars 
has recently arisen, led by Dahse and Wiener, which 
proves conclusively that before the divine names 
can be used for critical purposes the genuineness of 
the Massoretic text must be carefully examined. 
The versions of the Hebrew Bible often disagree 
with the Hebrew, and in many instances, particu- 
larly in the case of the Septuagint, Elohim is pre- 
supposed where the Tetragrammaton is given in 
Hebrew, and vice versa. Wellhausen has admitted 
this to be a sore point, and yet it is remarkable how 
utterly regardless of this necessary preliminary 
investigation the higher critics are, although they 
are always ready to assail the trustworthiness of the 
Massoretic text when it suits their purpose. Some 
modern scholars agree with the Rabbinic interpre- 


174 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


tation of the usage of the divine names in the 
Bible as representing different aspects of God’s 
essence. Professor Green states that Adonai denotes 
what God is in and to Israel; Hlohim what he is to 
other nations as well. ... “Elohim is the God of 
Creation and of Providence. ... Adonai is the God 
of Revelation and of Redemption. 

As to the theory that the different codes show 
different stages of religious development Baxter, 
in his work, Sanctuary and Sacrifice, has utterly 
demolished this as well as the views put forward 
by Wellhausen in his Prolegomena. Even Pro- 
fessor Toy, in his Judaism and Christianity, points 
out clearly that the law in general which the modern 
critical scholars regard as “legalistic and external” 
had larger consequences than its mere details would 
suggest, and he proceeds to tell how we can learn 
from the sayings of the great teachers of the second 
century that there was no discrimination in the 
legal school between the ceremonial and the moral. 
Both were of equal import and equal significance. 
If, as we are repeatedly being told, legalism was so 
influential in suppressing the spiritual side of reli- 
gion, how are we to explain the fact that in Ezekiel 
—the great legalistic prophet of the Old Testament 
—the ideas of individual responsibility as well as 
the creation of a new heart are emphasized much 
more than by those of his prophetic predecessors? 
It is our firm conviction that just as within recent 
years Christian scholars have come to realize that 


JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 175 


the Pharisees of the times of Jesus can no longer 
be regarded as the hypocrites they are represented 
in the New Testament, so the time is not far distant 
when as a result of advance in Hebrew and biblical 
scholarship it will be generally agreed that the 
higher critical views now held by so many scholars 
as working hypotheses in their explanations of bibli- 
cal exegesis are untenable. 

Finally, there is one very unfortunate aspect of 
the attitude of the higher critical school which, as 
Jews, we cannot help noting. Schechter, many years 
ago, described higher criticism as “the higher anti- 
Semitism which burns the soul though it leaves the 
body unhurt.” There is no doubt that Schechter’s 
strong statement was in many respects perfectly 
justifiable. This does not mean, of course, that every 
higher critic is an anti-Semite; that would be absurd. 
But an examination of the writings of Wellhausen, 
Friedrich Delitzch, and some of the other higher 
critical scholars shows that the theory—although it 
is regarded as a purely scientific investigation— 
has an undercurrent of anti-Jewish bias which 
recommends it to some European scholars. There 
is a feeling that the relative importance of the New 
Testament has become enhanced through the attacks 
upon the integrity of the Old Testament, and this 
in itself has caused these higher critical.doctrines to 
win such popularity amongst many Gentile scholars. 
It is certainly unfortunate that the anti-Semitism 
of scholars of the type of Wellhausen and Delitzsch 


176 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


should be refracted through the love and reverence 
which English and American theologians have for 
the Bible, who, whilst excising and expurgating the 
hatred contained in the writings of their German 
teachers, leave us with the fruits of their investiga- 
tions which are so unsound from a scientific point 
of view and so unacceptable from a Jewish stand- 
point. 

Let us Jews bear in mind that the difficulties of 
the Bible noted by the higher critical scholars were 
raised by the Rabbis of the Talmudic period and by 
their successors. The attitude, however, of many 
of these commentators toward these problems was 
much more acceptable even from a purely scholarly 
point of view than that of many of our “scientific” 
scholars. Thinkers of the type of Maimonides, 
Nachmanides, Ibn Ezra, and Kimchi were true 
biblical critics. They had a complete mastery of 
Hebrew, which to them was a living language, and 
were well acquainted with the ancient manners and 
local customs with which a large portion of Bible 
history is connected. And as a result of the applica- 
tion of their knowledge, philosophy, critical acumen, 
and inexorable criticism the Bible appeared like gold 
from the furnace. 

When we Jews refer to our traditional view of the 
Bible we do not mean to infer that its attitude is 
opposed to criticism. Tradition does not necessarily 
mean the opposite of scientific criticism, for tradition 
has in itself a scientific value. We feel, however, 


JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 177 


that no true scientific criticism has yet been forth- 
coming which can replace the traditional, unpreju- 
diced view we hold with reference to the composition 
and authorship of the Pentateuch. 

In fact, the whole history of the Hebrews goes to 
confirm how favorable amongst them was the spirit 
for the veracity of literary tradition and for the 
conservation of written documents. In the time of 
Moses, particularly, we read of the men whom he 
selected to settle the smaller matters of judgment 
(Ex. xxvii.) and the Seventy Elders by whom he 
was assisted. A contemporary literary spirit is shown 
by the Book of the Wars of the Lord (Num. xxi. 14) 
and “The Book of Jasher”’ (Josh. x. 18), which 
whenever its final recension took place contained 
ancient poems and a well song (Num. xxi. 17, 18). 
Popular national education had its founder in 
Moses (Deut. iv. 5, 2, 9, 29); every father was to 
instruct his children and write the great command- 
ments on his doorposts (Deut. vi. 7-9), but the spe- 
cial office of teaching was placed in the hands of the 
Levites (Deut. xxxiil. 10). 

There is hardly any period in the history of the 
Hebrews when traces of careful literary instinct 
seemed to be lacking. The literary spirit existed 
during the troubles and the disunited times of the 
Judges, as may be seen from the fine poem of the 
fifth chapter of that book, and the age of Solomon 
was also one of literary production. In fact, the 
golden age of David and Solomon seems to have 


178 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


been a period of exceptionally great intellectual 
activity. The birth of psalmody and proverbial 
philosophy dates from this time, and this is only to 
be expected, for all peoples on reaching their meri- 
dian of stabilty grow high in aspiration and com- 
mence researches into their origins and the codifica- 
tion and revision of their religious and legalistic 
literature. The schools of the prophets were con- 
tinued till the Exile, and there were students of the 
ancient records in the courts of the Temple. 

It seems incredible to us that such narratives as 
those recorded in the Pentateuch, with all their local 
coloring, geographical atmosphere, and abundance 
and particularity of detail, should have been com- 
piled centuries later from fragments differentiated 
by difference of age and of standpoint, by writers 
who used them at their will and were entirely 
ignorant of the events which they recorded. 

To us the whole theory of the successive origin 
and gradual growth of the different codes of the 
Pentateuchal law is opposed to the explicit state- 
ments of the Pentateuch itself, and it is utterly 
inconsistent with the history on which it is pro- 
fessedly based. Both the book found in the Temple 
in the reign of Josiah and that brought forward and — 
read by Ezra after the Exile are expressly declared 
to have been not recent productions but the law 
. of Moses. It is simply preposterous for us to be 
asked to believe that a body of laws never before 
heard of could have been imposed upon the people 





JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 179 


as though they had been given by Moses centuries 
previously, and that they could have been accepted 
and obeyed notwithstanding the fact that they 
imposed new and serious burdens upon the people 
and set aside established usages to which they were 
devotedly attached. 

Again, historical experience proves conclusively 
that genius cannot exist without some possibility of 
social appreciation. There is a certain degree of 
action and reaction in the production and influence 
of great men. A Beethoven or a Mozart is an impos- 
sible product in a savage or primitive nation. Their 
very existence implies some culture and appreciation 
—no matter how low the level may be—in the 
nation that produced them. Similarly, the prophets 
and poets of our own days have won for themselves 
distinction by enunciating truths which we accept as 
self evident, by proclaiming great principles which 
our deepened insight perceives to constitute the 
basis of all morality, and by creating forms of 
beauty to which our heightened and purified sense 
looks up as a standard of ideal perfection. And this 
could not be unless the intuitions of genius call 
forth echoes from the depths of our soul, awaking 
dormant faculties which can apprehend if they can- 
not create, which can respond if they cannot 
originate. 

It is impossible for us to believe that the towering 
genius and ascendancy of Moses were entirely the 
creation of a later age. For surely the great mag- 


180 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


nanimous Moses could not have existed in a social 
vacuum. There must have been some kind of social 
appreciation, and the greater the influence, the 
greater the education of the circle, the greater the 
guarantee of the preservation ofthe writings and the 
work which he wrote or authorized as his. Surely, 
the men who knew Moses would not have attributed 
to him a work of which he was not the author. 

We cannot help feeling that the British and 
American schools of biblical criticism lean too much 
upon a German authority which at the source is 
tainted with prejudices of which the existence is 
unquestioned. If the traditional view of the author- 
ship of the Pentateuch can be proved to be entirely 
incorrect by unprejudiced scientific evidence, then 
it certainly ought to be laid aside. For the present, 
however, no such unprejudiced evidence has been 
forthcoming, and history would thus sink into hope- 
less scepticism if it would attach no importance to 
tradition. 

We are prepared to agree that certain portions of 
the Pentateuch may possibly have been added later 
than the time of Moses. For example, the Rabbis 
suggested long ago that the last eight verses of 
Deuteronomy recording the death of Moses were 
written by Joshua. This, however, does not prevent 
our right to maintain that the main body of the 
Pentateuch in its present form is a unity, one con- 
tinuous work, the product of a single writer. The 
real question resolves itself into whether the Penta- 





JUDAISM AND THE HIGHER CRITICISM 181 


teuch is a continuous product from a single pen, 
whatever may have been the sources from which the 
material is derived. 

Professor Green has well analyzed the whole prob- 
lem of the unity of the Pentateuch in the following 
words: 


By the unity of the Pentateuch is meant that 
it is, in its present form, one continuous work, 
the product of a single writer. This is not 
opposed to the idea of his having before him 
written sources in any number or variety from 
which he may have drawn his materials, pro- 
vided the final composition was his own. It is 
of no consequence, so far as our present inquiry 
is concerned, whether the facts related were 
learned from preéxisting writings or from 
credible tradition, or from his own personal 
knowledge or from immediate divine revela- 
tion. From whatever source the materials may 
have been gathered, if all has been cast into the 
mold of the writer’s own thoughts, presented 
from his point of view and arranged upon a 
plan and method of his own, the work possesses 
the unity which we maintain. Thus Bancroft’s 
History of the United States rests upon a multi- 
tude of authorities which its author consulted 
in the course of its preparation; the facts which 
it records were drawn from a great variety of 
preéxisting written sources; and yet as we pos- 
sess it, it is the product of one writer, who first 
made himself thoroughly acquainted with his 


182 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


subject and then elaborated it in his own 
language and according to his own preconceived 
plans. It would have been very different if 
his care had simply been to weave together his 
authorities in the form of a continuous narra- 
tive, retaining in all cases their exact language, 
but incorporating one into another or supple- 
menting one by another so as to string the sev- 
eral sources together in the form of a continuous 
narrative. In this case it would not have been 
Bancroft’s history. He would have been really 
the compiler of a work consisting of a series of 
extracts from various authors.’ 


Finally, let us recall the words of one distinguished 
scholar who rightly says: “The questions raised by 
literary criticism in this century have, of course, to 
be met and they have their interest. But, after all, 
to tell the plain truth, they are mere child’s play 
compared with the real problem presented to the 
heart and mind by the Bible itself. They may be 
the higher criticism, but they are very far from 
being the highest; for they do not touch the ulti- 
mate realities with which the Scriptures deal and 
they arise in too great a degree from mere insensi- 
bility to such realities or from failure to appreciate 
them.” 


1 Essay on “The Unity of the Pentateuch,” by Henry Green in 
Anti-Higher Criticism, by L. W. Munhall. 





Where but from heaven, could men unskilled in arts, 
In several ages born, in several parts, 

Weave such agreeing truths? or how, or why, 
Should all conspire to cheat us with a le? 
Unasked their pains, ungrateful their advice, 
Starving their gain and martyrdom their price. 


DRYDEN. 


The God consciousness comes to one person through 
one faculty, to others through another, and to some 
through no discoverable special channel, but rather 
through the whole mind in its ordinary occupations. 


Con: Religion of a Mature Mind. 


183 





CHAPTER VI 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 


Freedom of natural expression in the composition of the books 
of the Bible—Inspiration and revelation—Inspiration of man 
by man—Book revelation—Inspiration varies according to 
circumstances—In spite of the diversity of authorship of the 
various books of the Bible they all represent the most ele- 
vated conceptions of the nature and character of God—Ver- 
bal inspiration. 


Many Jews would say that, if a man has come in 
any way whatever to a devout belief in the sacred- 
ness and inspiration of the Bible, he ought to be 
left undisturbed in his comfortable faith, and that to 
unsettle his mind by requiring of him the reasons 
of his confidence would be a most reprehensible act 
sure to cause much anxiety and entail unnecessary 
mental labor. 3 

To tell a man that he must believe in the Bible 
because I do, or because the Bible is true, or because 
he will be lost if he does not, is to show a poverty 
of resource which is truly pitiable; and yet, what 
else when stripped of verbiage would the replies of 
many Jews amount to? Remember that inquiry is 
not confined to unbelievers. Can we not all recount 
instances of certain friends whom we have known 

185 


186 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


for years as most devout Jews and with whom we 
may have even worshiped at times suddenly inform- 
ing us that they are anxious to regain their unques- 
tioning reliance on and belief in the Bible? How 
often do we meet with men who after having felt 
themselves secure for some time have suddenly fal- 
len victims to infidelity and have left Judaism 
entirely? Do we not meet regularly in our daily 
life men and women who at one time were stanch 
adherents of traditional Judaism, and in whom, for 
some reason we cannot explain, a fall has taken 
place which is sudden, complete, and irretrievable. 
How are we to explain the fact which we see daily 
of Jews whose religious fortifications seemed secure 
and impregnable falling before the merest rustle of 
wind? Is it not due to the fact that many of these 
so-called firm believers never even felt it necessary 
to cast a glance at their fortifications? One cannot 
believe that men should suddenly surrender faith 
without a struggle unless their faith never had any 
solid foundation. 

The thinking Jew is often tempted to explain how 
God inspired the Bible or how he exerted an 
influence upon the writers of the various books. 
This is of course a matter of which man can know 
little indeed and concerning which he can only 
speculate. God certainly did not control his writers 
in a mechanical way. His control of the authors 
of the various books was not similar to that of a boy 
controlling his jumping toys. In this sacred work 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 187 


there must have been the freedom of natural expres- 
sion, as the writers themselves show in their respec- 
tive books. We are told by the different prophets 
of the Bible that God spoke to them. What this 
expression really means we cannot tell, we can only 
conjecture. It is possible that they themselves did 
not know how they were affected by a higher spirit. 

If God wishes to make Himself known to man He 
must take the initiative. This is the meaning of the 
terms “inspiration” and “revelation.” God is said 
to reveal; that is, to uncover some piece of truth 
about Himself. God “inspires”; that is, breathes 
into men the power to discover and understand the 
truth that He is revealing. 

We must remember that the biblical story is writ- 
ten under the idea of an inspired arrangement in 
human affairs. No one thing is to be judged as 
occurring alone. It is merely an item in a connected 
scene. Separately viewed, a thing may seem con- 
trary to all our ideas of morals. “It is the back- 
ward thrust of the piston. But the backward 
thrust, by the wise combination in the mechanism of 
the engine, is just as helpful in propulsion as is the 
forward thrust.” God is the great factor in the his- 
tory of the Bible. His plan is a series of events 
under one perpetual superintendence. The early 
going-down to Egypt was, when seen alone, a back- 
ward step, but as seen historically today it was a 
splendid move. The captivity at Babylon helped 
the theistic idea into world-wide prominence. As 


188 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


with the larger, so with the smaller steps. As with 
nations, so with individuals. 

As we have noted, the word “inspire” literally 
means to breathe into, to infuse a supernatural idea 
or life into the human mind. By the inspiration of 
the Bible we mean that God breathed into the mind 
of its authors its ideas and its great spiritual content. 
But we cannot tell how He prepared the mind of the 
writers so that there was harmony between the 
human and the divine. We can no more describe 
in detail the mystery of divine inspiration than we 
can explain the secret of the communication of ideas 
or of the communication of life. All we can say is 
that the writer is suddenly overcome by a certain 
emotion. Certain feelings seem to overwhelm him 
and he feels he must give expression to ideas which 
fill his mind, but the cause of it all he cannot 
explain. 

The inspiration of man by man is a recognized fact 
today and we are all agreed that man is inspirable. 
Just as God has endowed some men with health 
which He has denied to others, so He has selected 
certain men whom he has inspired with genius in 
certain directions. We see daily how great masters 
of thought who lived centuries ago have impressed 
themselves by spoken or written words on large sec- 
tions of the human race. They still seem to stir 
others to think. Plato and Aristotle, Dante and 
Milton, Homer and Vergil still rule millions of men 
from their urns, and their audience seems to grow 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 189 


larger with the increasing years of the world’s his- 
tory. Philosophers, poets, and statesmen who have 
long passed out of earthly existence still speak to the 
world and lead nations. And whenever some gifted 
man arises today who can succeed in touching the 
chords that are waiting to break into music in every 
human heart, the world of mind vibrates anew. 

Now, surely, if ordinary mortals can succeed in 
influencing the minds and hearts of men with human 
inspiration, are we not warranted in expecting God 
to grant us divine inspiration? The capacity for 
religious inspiration differs amongst races as 
amongst individuals. That God should have selected 
the Hebrews, the foremost monotheistic believers of 
the world, and should have given special revelation 
as to the meaning of historic events and as to the 
meaning of moral truth to special souls among them, 
and then should have given also special inspiration 
to record these events and these revelations, is surely 
not beyond the bounds of our comprehension. 

We can understand that God has divinely inspired 
men who had the “genius for religion,” and that the 
result was a series of books written indeed by men, 
each writer exhibiting his own peculiar style and, 
equally, each under the guidance consciously or 
unconsciously of special, divine inspiration. 

Now, whilst many people can understand revela- 
tion by word of mouth, they seem to have difficulty 
in understanding the meaning of book revelation. 
We have already noted that there are numerous 


199 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


examples in literature of what may be called human 
inspiration in which a man of remarkable genius 
impresses his thoughts on others so deeply that a 
whole generation of writers and speakers has felt his 
preponderating influence. To explain how this force 
of inspiration acts we might take the work of a 
painter and analyze the way in which it effects its 
influence in inspiring those who behold it. A painter 
has a great thought and then gives expression to it 
on canvas: with his brush and paints he represents 
on canvas the thought by which he has been 
inspired. A person standing in front of the picture 
where the light falls on it sees a number of colored 
pigments laid roughly on a canvas. The picture is 
purely objective, but its reflection through the trans- 
mitting light waves falls on the retina of the eye, 
and the optic nerve transmits it again to the brain. 
The picture is transmitted into thought and we are 
thus able to get at the message by which the artist 
was originally inspired. Why can we not under- 
stand inspiration acting in a similar way in the case 
of a divinely inspired author? 

The fact that God should have revealed himself 
to man through a great book is not beyond our com- 
prehension. It is not difficult for us to understand 
that God should teach man made in His image by a 
book. Previous to His revelation by the aid of 
human literature He used innumerable means in 
order to reveal Himself to man. He made the world 
not only for man’s dwelling place but for the mani- 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 191 


festation of His own wisdom and power. ‘All thy 
works praise thee,” cried the devout Hebrew singer 
of olden times. We have only to look at some of the 
beauties of this world to realize the wise artistic 
force that must have brought them into creation. 
If architecture and sculpture and painting and all 
the beauties of nature reveal the work of God 
through the genius of man and are in a sense His 
handwriting, we can easily bring ourselves to believe 
that the handwriting of God through the handwrit- 
ing of men in the forms of human literature is within 
the bounds of the possible. If we believe human 
language to be a special gift of God bestowed that 
man might speak not only to his Creator but to his 
fellow men, then that power of consecutive thought 
which lies back of human language and finds in it its 
expression can be utilized in this divine wisdom by 
furnishing such a book to the world. 

Inspiration like every other divine gift varies 
according to circumstances. We can imagine to our- 
selves at one time the sacred historian, uncon- 
sciously, it may be, yet freely seizing on those facts 
in the history of the past which were the turning 
points of a nation’s spiritual progress, gathering the 
details which combine to give the truest picture of 
each crisis, and grouping all according to the laws 
of a marvelous symmetry which in aftertimes might 
symbolize their hidden meaning. Or we may see 
the prophet gazing intently on the great struggle 
going on around him, discerning the spirits of men 


192 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


and the springs of national life till the relations of 
time no longer exist in his vision—till all strife is 
referred to the final conflict of good and evil fore- 
shadowed in the great judgments of the world. 
Another, perhaps, looks within his own heart, and 
as a new light is poured over its inmost depths, his 
devotion finds expression in songs of personal peni- 
tence and thanksgiving, in confession of sin and 
declarations of righteousness, whilst another actu- 
ally records the letter of the divine law which he 
feels he has received directly from God inscribed 
upon tablets of stone or spoken face to face. Thus 
all the different writings taken together may be con- 
sidered one harmonious message of God spoken in 
many parts and in many manners by men to men; 
the distinct lessons of individual ages reaching from 
one time to all time. 

In our study of the Bible we must not forget that 
the books of which it is composed were written in 
different countries under variant forms of national 
life and of civilization, and even in different 
languages. The Book of Job has as a background the 
archaic life of the Eastern desert; the historical 
books, the Psalms and Proverbs, and several of the 
prophecies were written in Palestine; whilst the 
Book of Ezekiel was written in Babylonia during the 
captivity. Hence, although the writers concerned 
in the production of the Bible were of one race, it 
is difficult to conceive circumstances and associa- 
tions more diversified than those in which they sev- 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 193. 


erally wrote—at one time living like Moses under 
the shadow of the monuments of Egypt and trained 
in the learning and art of her civilization, at other 
times in the wild freedom and grandeur of the desert 
and amid the simple manners of wandering tribes, 
and again at the capital of the Babylonian empire 
in the height of its luxury and splendor, or in the 
comparative seclusion of Judea among an agricul- 
tural people of plain habits and tastes and of no 
literary aspirations. 

Thus, amid the wide contrast of place, society, 
government, and religion, and in contact with all the 
leading forms of civilization and empire, these dif- 
ferent writers produced the books that compose our 
Bible. And yet, in spite of this diversity of author- 
ship, is it not remarkable that they all represent 
most elevated conceptions of the nature and the 
character of God, and some of these the highest con- 
ceptions of the Supreme Being that the human 
mind has ever formed? Everywhere in the Bible God 
appears as a spirit having life in Himself and the 
author of life to all creatures. His power, His wis- 
dom, His knowledge—in a word, all the attributes 
of His Being are eternal. The oneness of God in 
His Being is taught, or rather is assumed and 
recognized, by all the writers of the Bible in all their 
books. The account of the creation, the ten com- 
mandments, or of Isaiah’s vision of the divine 
majesty all represent God as an Infinite and 
Almighty Spirit. “Before the heavens were brought 


194 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


forth or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the 
world ... even from everlasting to everlasting Thou 
art God.” Again, His holiness is represented every- 
where as His crowning excellence—the sum of His 
moral attributes, the very essence and glory of his 
character. This view of the divine character which 
is uniform throughout all the books of the Bible 
is also peculiar to it. It is not borrowed from any 
other book or from any other religion. 

Some philosophers of Greece and Rome—notably 
Socrates, Plato, Cicero, and Epictetus—approached 
the conception of one spiritual God infinite in his 
nature and perfect in his attributes. Yet their 
best thoughts concerning God were crude and vague 
and they themselves were in doubt of their own 
speculation. In all the literature of antiquity, the 
books that compose the Bible are the only writings 
that unequivocally teach that there is but one God, 
a pure Spirit whose nature is infinite and whose 
attributes are perfect. And when we examine the 
ideas of God amongst the most cultivated of ancient 
nations, such as Egypt, Babylon, and Greece, we 
find that their mythology nowhere approached the 
idea of a God of perfect holiness so essential to a 
right conception of a Supreme Being. Their gods 
were either distorted images of human beings or 
photographs of human characters with virtues and 
defects intensely and even coarsely magnified. 

With such imperfect and unworthy views of God 
continually before them in the literature and the 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 195 


religions of all mankind, how came it to pass that 
these men of an obscure race, some shepherds or 
husbandmen, others scholars acquainted with the 
theology of Egypt and Babylon—men, some of 
whom were captives under idolatrous nations and 
others officials in courts where idol worship was con- 
ducted with state magnificence—how came it to 
pass that these men, writing centuries apart at such 
diverse times and in such diverse manners, have 
given to the world a conception of God in His 
spirituality, His eulogy, His infinity and, above all, 
in His holiness which no other minds had attained to 
and which is confessedly the highest possible con- 
ception of the Supreme Being? We can account for 
this intellectual and moral phenomenon—without a 
parallel in literature—only if we believe that God 
spoke through these writers; that He was revealed 
unto them so that they discerned His character, 
realized His presence, were moved by His spirit. 
We are justified, therefore, in arguing that the 
plan upon which the Bible as a whole is constructed 
and apparently has been designed is one of our best 
proofs of its divine inspiration, for it is certainly 
such as human wisdom could not have arranged or 
wrought. We see that although it was written by 
different authors, removed from one another by 
centuries of time and by changed conditions of 
society, it possesses a most singular unity—a unity 
not of sameness but of harmony; a unity of plan and 
orderly development—an organic unity. It is this 


196 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


organic unity of the Bible in addition to the unique 
sayings and utterances of exceptional value which it 
contains that constitutes its characteristic feature 
and shows it to be divinely inspired. It is obvious 
that not all parts of the Bible, any more than all 
parts of any other book, are of equal spiritual value. 
The genealogical and numerical lists of Chronicles, 
Ezra, and Nehemiah cannot be ranked intrinsically 
as high as the prophecies of Isaiah. But for all that, 
seeing that they are all intrinsic parts of an organic 
whole, and have a place which cannot be dispensed 
with in the organic whole, it follows that if this 
whole body of writings is to be regarded as the word 
of God, these part portions must also be of that 
Word. 

Our conclusion, therefore, is that the Bible can- 
not be regarded apart from divine inspiration, for 
a hand is seen in it as in no other history which has 
come down to us across the separating centuries. 
The events themselves and the book that records 
them shows something unaccountable when regarded 
apart from God’s inspiration. Its one special pur- 
pose is the development of God’s revelation of Him- 
self, and those who miss this message running 
through its pages are thus compelled to invent all 
kinds of theories to account for the prevalence in 
the history of Israel of ideas far in advance of what 
was possible by any merely natural evolution. In 
the words of one writer, “Such conceptions of God 
and of man’s duty to Him, such ideas of moral 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 197 


righteousness, such an outlook upon the material 
and spiritual universe are long centuries in advance 
of what any merely naturalistic student would 
expect to find. And so those who have set up the 
standard of natural moral developments have 
wished to re-date the books and to discover for them 
far later authors who wrote in far later times.” 

If we do not accept the belief in the divine inspira- 
tion of the Bible, how are we to account for these 
advanced moral conceptions which it represents? 
They cannot be explained as having grown from any 
natural germ or as being due to the spirit of the 
age, for the authors of these works saw far beyond 
their own nationality and times. 

Let us consider the meaning of the term “verbal 
inspiration,” as understood by the modern mind. 
To many the use of this expression is an occasion of 
scofing. They persist in thinking of verbal inspira- 
tion as if it were equivalent to God’s mechanically 
dictating words to the writers of Scripture, and 
simply ridicule such an idea. Surely, to the modern 
mind the term can easily be explained to mean that 
the Supreme Power who has inspired an author of a 
work has also inspired the work by which he 
expresses himself. We are all agreed that human 
thoughts and expression are inseparably connected. 
Why cannot we therefore understand that whatever 
affects one affects the other? If inspiration is a fact 
it necessarily touches the words as well as the ideas. 
Even those who accept the old traditional view of 


198 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


God dictating words, and the human author writing 
them down, cannot exclude from their mind the 
influence upon the work of the personal peculiarities 
of the author. For example, it has rightly been 
pointed out that most stenographers writing letters 
for a business man have to correct his grammatical 
errors and make emandations here and there, and 
it is noticeable that many business men change their 
literary style when they change their stenographer. 
When we say, therefore, that the sacred writers of 
the Bible were inspired it does not follow that there 
is not a human element as well as a divine element 
in their writings. They were men having their own 
natural gifts, differmg from one another in their 
previous education, and possessing a more or less 
extensive vocabulary. God did not by the gift of 
inspiration change their nature, but He consecrated 
it to His service so that the authors of the various 
books of the Bible have left an impress of their 
individual characters upon their writings. Amos— 
the shepherd prophet, called from the midst of his 
vocation as a herdsman—naturally used a rustic 
‘simplicity of style, very unlike the refined and ele- 
vated language of the royal prophet Isaiah. 
Finally, let us note that the criterion of the truth 
of a revelation lies not in the particular circum- 
stances with which its original communication was 
accompanied, but in the sustained appeal which it 
makes to the heart and reason and conscience of 
men, in the power which it possesses to answer the 


IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 199 


obstinate questions of the soul and to inspire the 
peace which passes all understanding. It is because 
the messages transmitted to the world through the 
Bible have been submitted to this test and have been 
approved of in the result that we Jews claim the 
justification of regarding it to be of divine origin. 











Two angels guide, 
The path of man, both aged and yet young, 
As angels are, ripening through endless years, 
On one he leans: some call her Memory, 
And some Tradition; and her voice is sweet, 
With deep mysterious accord: the other, 
Floating above, holds down a lamp which streams 
A light divine and searching on the earth, 
Compelling eyes and footsteps. Memory yields, 
Yet clings with loving cheek, and shines anew, 
Reflecting all the rays of that bright lamp 
Our angel Reason holds. We had not walked 
But for Tradition; we walk evermore 
To higher paths by brightening Reason’s lamp. 


Georce Exiot: Spanish Gypsy. 


201 





CHAPTER VII 


JEWISH TRADITION—ITS NATURE AND SIGNIFICANCE 


In addition to the Bible which forms the basis of Jewish thought, 
Judaism consists of a huge superstructure, the teachings of 
tradition—Sabbath laws—The obscurities of the Bible led to 
the interchanges of views and the submission of new ideas— 
Work of Jochanan ben Zakkai—Judaism preserved itself for 
a considerable time upon an unwritten tradition—Amongst 
non-literary peoples the memory serves in place of the written 
word—It is not the written tradition which constitutes the 
life of a people but the unwritten tradition—Difference 
between traditional and documental evidence—Mishnah and 
Talmud—Jewish tradition was the great saving force of 
Judaism, for it was by means of tradition that the Torah 
was vitalized. 


We have hitherto dealt with the Bible, its great- 
ness and divine inspiration, but though we have 
found it to be a very fine expression of religion 
and morality, we must remember that it does not 
exhaust the whole of Judaism. <A knowledge of 
Judaism cannot be obtained from the Bible alone. 
Whilst the Torah forms the basis of Jewish thought, 
an appreciation of the religious progress to which 
Judaism lays claim can be obtained only through 
the whole of its literature, which includes a knowl- 
edge of the history and development of post-bibli- 
cal literature also. Judaism is not the religion of the 

203 


204 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Patriarchs, Pentateuch, and the prophets only. It is 
ethical monotheism colored by the history of the 
Jewish people, and is a development ever continuing 
as that people or race or religious body survives from 
age to age, from clime to clime. We thus see that 
in addition to the Bible, which forms the basis of 
Jewish thought, Judaism consists of a huge super- 
structure—the teachings of tradition. Judaism is 
thus neither restricted to the Bible nor to the sur- 
roundings of Palestine. That environment marked 
only the point of its origin. As the real history of 
the Jew, as distinct from the Hebrew, may be said 
to have begun with the Roman capture of Jerusa- 
lem, when he exchanged a strip of soil for the uni- 
verse, so his religion, which is not Mosaism or 
Rabbinism but Judaism, attained its greatest 
breadth when the sacrificial culte disappeared, 
prayer became the substitution for burnt offerings, 
and schools and synagogues spread in every land. 
Ideals change, customs vary, opinions clash, and 
out of this everlasting conflict Judaism obtains new 
life and vigor. This is one secret of its survival. 
Sinai was thus not the only source from which 
revelation came to Israel. The God of the Penta- 
teuch and of the prophets revealed himself also to 
the Rabbinic teachers of Judaism, and there was a 
continuous process of evolution and development 
connecting the Bible with later traditions. 
Judaism, being a “way of life” rather than a sys- 
tem of theology, consists of rites, observances, and 





ee a ee ee ee oe ee 


OS eed py tein, 


JEWISH TRADITION 205 


ceremonials as well as ethical practices and religious 
beliefs. If, as a “way of life,” it was to function 
effectively, it must have had an oral law to explain 
and interpret the Bible and to clarify scriptural 
enactments and render their observance practicable. 
For example, the command not to kindle a fire in 
our habitation on the Sabbath day if carried out 
literally would have made the seventh day, during 
the cold winter months, a day of sadness and mis- 
ery. Again, the command that “No man shall go 
forth from his place on the Sabbath day,” could 
certainly never have been intended to be taken 
literally. How were these passages to be explained 
so that the true spirit of the Sabbath day be 
observed without any transgression of the biblical 
commands concerning it? Surely, side by side with 
the Mosaic code there must have been an oral tra- 
dition as to the true interpretations of the difficult 
passages in the Bible and of the usages and customs 
connected with them. Again, we are told that the 
man found gathering sticks on the Sabbath day 
was brought to Moses and put to death for break- 
ing one of the Sabbath laws. The people must have 
known that this act constituted a labor prohibited 
on the Sabbath day even though there is no distinct 
statement concerning it in the written Sabbath laws, 
otherwise the Sabbath breaker would have com- 
mitted the sin in ignorance. It is also of interest 
to note that from the account given in the Book 
of Haggai-(ii. 11) it would appear that there were 


206 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


many details concerning the laws of cleanness and 
uncleanness which were known to the priests and 
prophets to a greater extent than explained in the 
written law. Furthermore, as time went on, numer- 
ous new regulations and practices, based on the com- 
mands of the Pentateuch, came into force, and these, 
together with the explanations, commentaries, and 
detailed accounts of the written commands of the 
Bible, formed the contents of the oral law. 

We thus see that side by side with the Bible there 
has been from the very earliest time a form of its 
interpretation and exegesis which has been known 
as the oral law as distinguished from the Bible itself 
—the written law. In fact, even in the Bible itself 
traces of various interpretations of the Pentateuchal 
code and institutions can be seen. For example, 
when Jeremiah says that God did not command 
Israel concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices from 
the time that He had brought them out of Egypt, 
he was merely explaining that the laws in Leviticus 
with reference to sacrifices were given to Israel as 
a concession to popular custom, but not with the 
express desire of making Israel regard them as the 
truest form of worship. 

But difficult points were always arising in their 
attempts to adhere to the true spirit and letter of 
the Torah and modifications in the law were con- 
stantly being introduced by the Rabbis. For exam- 
ple, during the Maccabean war the rigid observance 
of the Sabbath was an impossibility, and it was 


ee en ee ee 


oe eel ery 


— 
i 


JEWISH TRADITION 207 


decided, therefore, that it was permissible to defend 
one’s own life even on the Sabbath. 

Questions of this nature must have presented 
themselves to the observant at the execution of 
every law, seeing that in the Bible the details are 
rarely added, whilst the necessity of their being 
strictly carried out in all particulars is emphatically 
enjoined. Some of these details might be ascer- 
tained from: tradition; and tradition, therefore, had 
to be collected and sifted. Other details could be 
learned by carefully analyzing the biblical passages 
which treated of the institution, whilst in cases 
where no aid could be obtained from these sources 
recourse was had to analogies, conjectures, and 
other methods resulting from rules which were laid 
down for the interpretation of unexplained proscrip- 
tions. This necessitated the formation of the order 
of scribes which, properly speaking, commenced 
with Ezra (vii. 6), who was surnamed the “Scribe.” 
Their zeal, Ingenuity, and learning was devoted to 
the work of arranging and systematizing these rec- 
ords which, after having received in the course of 
ages many accretions, became known as the tradi- 
tional or oral law. 

The obscurities and difficulties of the Bible had 
led to interchanges of views and the submission of 
new ideas. ‘These explanations naturally varied 
according to times and circumstances and they were 
passed on orally from age to age, thus accumulat- 
ing into a mass of tradition which had its roots in 


208 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


the dim past, and, having grown by the side of the 
Bible as the living system of its application in 
everyday life, obtained the same sanctity as the 
Bible itself. “The oral law was as binding as the 
written law, for they were both the words of the 
Living God.” In the oral law the laws of the Bible 
are thus explained and adapted to later circum- 
stances so that they can be workable in every sense 
of the term. Once a decision was reached it was 
as binding as the original command in the Bible 
from which it arose; whilst a “fence” was even put 
around the law so as to prevent its being broken. 

Critical scholars of the type of Zunz have shown 
in a scientific way how the oral law and Jewish 
tradition may be traced right from the biblical 
period, how the voice of God never ceased to deliver 
its message to Israel at all times, and how Israel 
received its instructions through all ages by means 
of inspired prophets, scribes, sages, and scholars, 
each of whom by their respective methods of inter- 
pretation and exegesis contributed toward the one 
long chain of never-ending Jewish tradition and 
Hebraic thought. 

The destruction of the Temple and the conver- 
sion of Judaism from a commonwealth into a syna-— 
gogue caused the Rabbis to feel that a new era in 
Jewish history was commencing, and they regarded 
it their duty, therefore, to collect together the old 
traditional laws so that they would now assume 
some definite form. During the Babylonian Exile 


JEWISH TRADITION 209 


many biblical laws connected with the Temple wor- 
ship could not be observed and were gradually 
becoming obsolete, whilst many other laws, partic- 
ularly those which related specifically to Jewish life 
in Palestine, such as those dealing with agriculture, 
were no longer in use, and there was the danger of 
their being lost. The Rabbis felt that once these 
laws had been codified there would be no fear what- 
ever of their being lost entirely. With the destruc- 
tion of the Temple at Jerusalem in 70 c.z., Jochanan 
ben Zakkai became leader of the Jewish people. 
Though he loved Zion and wept bitterly over its 
destruction, he realized the immediate need for the 
creation of a new Jewish center of learning. 
Jochanan was a remarkable man in many ways. 
Although a teacher of considerable distinction and 
originality, he was a most modest man. But his 
outstanding greatness lay in his realizing at the time 
that charity and love of man could replace the 
sacrifices. 

A new period of Hebrew literature now com- 
menced. The religious traditions and _ historical 
writings of the past were all carefully sifted and 
examined and numerous additions were made. But 
the literature of the Rabbis was not yet written 
down as had been done with the Bible, but was 
committed to memory and handed down orally from 
teacher to pupil. The Jewish council was trans- 
ferred to Jamnia and this city thus became the 
center of Jewish scholarship, retaining that position 


210 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


until 135 c.z. The Rabbis may have lectured to their 
students in a vineyard, just as the Greek philos- 
ophers delivered their discourses in the gardens of 
the “academy” at Athens, or the term “vineyard” 
may have been used only in a metaphorical sense 
in order to describe the pleasant intellectual gather- 
ings which took place there. In any case, the 
“vineyard of Jamnia” became the home of Rab- 
binic learning and scholarship. The literary actiy- 
ity connected with this period marked the com- 
mencement of the preservation of the oral tradition, 
which was from time to time gradually developed 
and expounded, adapted and modified, till it 
assumed a written form in the “Mishnah.” 

We thus see how Judaism was able to preserve 
itself for a considerable time upon an unwritten 
tradition, and it is only natural therefore that many 
of the early Rabbis of the Talmudic period, who 
lived much nearer to biblical times than we do, 
should have known more of the early history of 
the Hebrews and should have had a much finer 
feeling for and better understanding of their psy- 
chology than we today. 

The fact that these traditions were preserved 
orally from generation to generation should cause 
us no astonishment. We all know how amongst 
non-literary peoples the memory serves in place 
of the written word. In India today there are rude 
tribes in a somewhat primitive stage of civilization 
who will commit to memory every jot and tittle of 


JEWISH TRADITION 211 


a long, complicated treaty between themselves and 
a civilized government. And, curiously enough, one 
can point to tribes amongst whom such details have 
been handed down with the utmost accuracy from 
one generation to another. True as this is of prim- 
itive illiterate peoples, it is equally true of literary 
races who have reached quite an advanced stage 
of culture. 

We will now proceed to consider what is actually 
meant by the term “tradition.” Literally, of course, 
tradition is a handing over of a thing from one to 
another. The word is also used for the things that 
are passed on. We refer to the traditions of a 
nation, a society, a university, or a school. And 
now we can begin to realize the basic meaning of 
a national tradition. Let us take, as an instance, 
the national traditions of the American people. 
Among these traditions there is a considerable 
amount that has been formulated or preserved in 
writing such as “Acts of Congress,” ‘Legal Prece- 
dences,” “Literary Contributions,” etc. These are, 
of course, of the utmost importance in describing 
to us what true Americanism stands for. Yet vastly 
important as these may be they are certainly not 
the essentials. It is not the written tradition which 
constitutes the life of a people but the wnwritten 
tradition. If the written accounts of all these tra- 
ditions to which we have referred were suddenly 
to disappear, the American people would still exist 
intact. Similarly, it is not formule or written 


212 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


accounts which, as Jews, have made us what we 
are, but those characteristics of body and mind, 
those virtues and emotions, those habits of think- 
ing and of feeling, which have passed from genera- 
tion to generation. 

We maintain primitive tradition because it pos- 
sesses the claims to veneration and respect which 
we assign to it and because Jews have always 
referred to it as to a true and real authority respect- 
ing Jewish observance and practice. This argu- 
ment, it will be observed, is quite independent of 
all the practicable value of tradition. 

Though absolute and real authority is claimed 
only for a few great affirmative principles of doc- 
trine—the great landmarks of Jewish teachings in 
all times—yet, besides these, there are doctrines and 
usages and expositions of Scripture claiming rever- 
ence and respect in proportion to the various 
degrees in which the voice of the Jewish people 
has been pronounced respecting them. Many of 
these are of extreme antiquity and prevalence; they 
pervade our belief and practice to such extent as 
to give them the whole of their peculiar color; they 
furnish the rules and principles of Scripture inter- 
pretation much further than we can conceive; they 
blend and mingle so intimately with our very fac- 
ulties of Jewish understanding that we cannot, if 
we would, regard Judaism without them. They 
alone satisfy the daily details of thoughts, doubts, 
duties, dangers, and conduct. And this sort of tra- 


JEWISH TRADITION 213 


dition, witnessed and in great measure embodied in 
the writings of past ages, is the peculiar possession 
of catholic Israel. With its aid Judaism instructs 
us daily in her doctrines and teachings. With its 
aid she meets every new emergent case of difficulty 
in which her decision is desired and her authority 
deferred to. With it she teaches what she proves 
from the Bible. 

For a long time tradition was regarded by sci- 
entific investigators as the Cinderella of history. 
Like the ugly sisters, historians behaved toward it 
haughtily and with condescension, and it was kept 
severely in the background. This treatment was 
based on the apparently sound arguments that, in 
order to deserve attention, tradition must be proved 
to be true; that, since oral testimony is the founda- 
tion of traditions, they cannot readily be proved to 
be true; and that there, for all sensible people, was 
an end of the matter. 

Now, in order to understand the real importance 
of traditions, we must bear in mind that their true 
value lies in the fact that they preserve the thought 
of our forefathers even though what they thought 
may be considered by many as incorrect. It has 
rightly been said that, “We may find men wrong 
in what they thought they were, but we cannot find 
them wrong in what they thought they thought.” 
It may not be true that King Alfred burnt the 
cakes, but it is true that his subjects thought it 
happened. A document may be discovered any day 


214 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


by some scholar which will prove that Alfred was 
never defeated by the Danes, but it would be use- 
less to expect us to believe that he was a bad king 
hated by his subjects. The chorus of the voices 
of our forefathers speaking with undiminished vigor 
through the gramophone we call tradition will be 
raised to give the lie to the hypothesis, for docu- 
ments may come and documents may go but tra- 
dition goes on forever. 

One of the credentials of traditions is the integrity 
of their origin. Whilst rumors usually originate 
with some set purpose and then, after being a nine 
days’ wonder, die down for want of the credence 
of honest men, traditions are of innocent and sub- 
conscious extraction and their growth is gradual and 
steady, gathering volume with time. They are 
based on honest conviction, and men repeat them 
not because they have an axe to grind, but almost 
inevitably and casually round the domestic hearth. 
King Alfred’s cakes may not have been burnt, but 
the whole story and similar incidents about him 
reveal to us the simplicity and generosity of the 
king. And so, in this naive and natural manner, 
we gain an insight into the ideas of our fathers 
and we learn what they thought—not what some 
historical personage wants us to think they thought. 

The difference between traditional and docu- 
mentary evidence may be best summarized by say- 
ing that, whilst the former represents the majority 
report, the latter is the report of the minority. It 


ae 


REE coe te oy 


pee me. 


es 


eee BS eect oe Stine: ain es ast eee + 


~ | Sethe a 
SS 


JEWISH TRADITION 215 


is not surprising, therefore, that they so often con- 
tradict each other. 

In dealing with historical documents we must 
bear in mind that on the strength of them we can- 
not pronounce a formal verdict on any subject 
unless we have first had access to every document 
dealing with that subject; and, furthermore, we 
cannot possibly tell when we have reached the 
limit of documentary evidence. Few of us have 
access to a large number of historical documents. 
We are obliged, therefore, to accept their authentic- 
ity on second-hand information. It behooves us, 
therefore, before accepting the authority of the his- 
torian, to find out what manner of man he is and 
to submit him to two invariable tests—in order to 
be sure that he is worthy of our attention. He 
must in the first place be honest, and in the second 
place well informed. Even then we must be on 
our guard, for the most fair-minded historian may 
be occasionally subject to prejudices which blind 
him. 

Even those anthropologists who deny to oral tra- 
dition of primitive tribes their face value cannot 
deny to them all value whatsoever. It is clear that 
even the wildest and manifestly most impossible 
tales may be of the utmost importance as revela- 
tions of the cultural status of the people who cherish 
them whether as annals of incidents that once 
occurred or as purely products of the imagination. 
We know, of course, from ethnological literature, 


216 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


as well as from a study of our civilization, the force 
of the human tendency to mingle fancy with fact, 
to introduce rationalistic afterthoughts, and to 
ignore the essential and apotheosize the trivial. In 
fact, our own historical perspective is only a slowly 
and painfully acquired product of recent years. 

E. A. Freeman, in his Methods of Historical 
Study, has summarized this point of view very 
well. He says: 


The kernel of all sound teaching in historical 
matters is the doctrine that no historical study 
is of any value which does not take in a knowl- 
edge of original authorities. Let no one mis- 
take this saying, as if I were laying down a 
rule that no knowledge of any historical matter 
can be of any value which does not come 
straight from an original authority. 

The fact is that Livy, Plutarch, and a crowd 
of others, though they are not original authori- 
ties in themselves, are original authorities to 
us. That is to say, we can for the most part 
get no further than what they tell us. We 
know that they copied earlier writers; we often 
know what earlier writers they copied. But 
those earlier writers are for the most part lost; 
to us Livy and Plutarch are their representa- 
tives. For a large part of their story we have 
no appeal from them except either to internal 
evidence or to any fragmentary authorities of 
other kinds that may be left to us. There is 
no counter-narrative. 


JEWISH TRADITION 217 


If, then, we are to define original authorities, 
we might perhaps define them as those writers 
from whom we have no appeal, except to other 
writers of the same class. 

We must remember that even the best con- 
temporary writer is commonly a_ primary 
authority for a part only of his subject. Though 
living at the time of which he writes, though 
often an actor in the scenes of which he writes, 
still he cannot always write from personal 
knowledge; he cannot have seen everything 
with his own eyes; he must constantly write 
only what he has been told by others, only he is 
able to judge of what is told him by others in a 
way that a later writer cannot do. And besides 
his narrative, there is often other contemporary 
evidence which for some purposes may be of 
higher authority than his narrative. The text 
of a proclamation or a treaty is, within its own 
range, of higher authority than the very best 
contemporary narrative. I say within its own 
range, because the official document, while it 
always proves a great deal, does not always 
prove everything. 

The later writers are by no means to be cast 
aside; it is often very important to see how 
they looked at the events of earlier times. 
The point to be understood is that they are not 
authorities, that they are not witnesses, that a 
statement made by a contemporary gains noth- 
ing in inherent value because it is copied over 
and over again by a hundred writers who are not 
contemporaries. Whenever a man at any date 


218 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


has special means of knowledge, he becomes so 
far an authority; a local writer or a man who 
has specially studied some particular class of 
subjects may be in this sense an authority, that 
is the nearest approach to an authority that we 
can get, even for times long before his own. 


We have noted how the sopherim, or scribes, 
became editors of the Sacred Text, the expositors of 
the Holy Writ and the regular teachers of the Jews. 
We moderns cannot form any adequate conception 
of the love which the ancient scribes had for the 
Bible, and we read in Rabbinic literature how 
scholars were able to write it entirely from memory 
and then instruct others in it quite gratuitously. 
Let us now proceed to consider how the work of the 
scribes developed. Once the thirst for knowledge 
had been aroused it could not easily be quenched, 
and we hear of a multiplicity of sects in Israel— 
the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes—all 
with different theories of the universe, different sys- 
tems for the salvation of the soul, and different 
interpretations of the law. 

The Pharisees, who were the successors of the 
scribes, were the group formed from the great mass 
of the people and were, therefore, representatives of 
the people as a whole. They were the adherents of 
the traditional interpretations of the law. The Sad- 
ducees, who appeared as the opponents of the 
Pharisees, professed more liberal and philosophic 
tenets, and were drawn chiefly from the wealthier 





JEWISH TRADITION 219 


section of Israel and those who enjoyed a liberal 
education; whilst the Essenes, and other sects of a 
similar type, had but a small following. 

A great difference between the Pharisees and Sad- 
ducees was based on the acceptance or rejection of 
those laws, interpretations, and commentaries which 
were not written but delivered by tradition from 
generation to generation. Circumstances necessi- 
tated a reinterpretation of many biblical commands, 
especially in their application to the daily life of the 
Jewish people. Furthermore, new laws and customs 
had arisen since the closing of the Canon, which 
together with their interpretations had been trans- 
mitted orally from generation to generation. The 
great Hillel, who was president of the Sanhedrin in 
the time of Herod, was the first to attempt to intro- 
duce some order into this chaotic mass of tradition 
by arranging it into six principle divisions. This 
work was resumed later by R. Akiba and R. Meir. 
But it was not until the time of R. Jehuda Hanasi, 
who flourished about the end of the second century, 
that a digest of the oral law was made which 
received general acceptance. With the works of 
Rabbi Akiba and R. Meir, as his basis, R. Jehuda 
Hanasi sifted the whole material of the oral law 
and added to it the decisions of his own academy 
concerning various doubtful points. He recorded the 
opinions which had been agreed upon by all quite 
anonymously, but where there was a divergence of 
view the name of the author was also mentioned. 


220 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Originally this work was designated the Mishnah of 
R. Jehuda, to distinguish it from that of R. Akiba 
and R. Meir, but as it was generally accepted as 
the authorized code of traditional Jewish law, it is 
known simply as the Mishnah par excellence. 

Whilst the Bible thus contains the written law of 
the Hebrews, the Mishnah contains the oral laws 
which have been handed down by tradition. The 
word “Mishnah” is connected with a Hebrew root 
which means “‘to repeat,” and then “‘to learn” or “to 
teach”; and the word thus came to mean “‘teaching” 
of the oral tradition. The language of the Mishnah 
is aremarkable example of the flexibility of Hebrew 
and its ability to adapt itself to varying conditions 
of life. It is a logical development of the language 
of the Bible adapted to a newer form of civilization 
and suited to the needs of a later time. It is usually 
designated as ‘“Neo-Hebraic” to distinguish it from 
the Hebrew in which the Bible is written. Although 
the Mishnah contains here and there some interest- 
ing exegetical passages, it is mainly legalistic in 
character and its discussions and laws deal with 
every aspect of life—religion, commerce, social 
duties, ete. 

Later the laws of the Mishnah were discussed, 
commented upon, and explained at the Jewish 
academies of Palestine and Babylon, and the authen- 
tic records of these discussions are called ‘‘Gemara.” 
The laws, interpretations and constructions of these 





JEWISH TRADITION 221 


laws, dissertations, expositions, comments, explana- 
tions, and glosses were now collected with the Mish- 
nah and embodied in one volume known as the 
“Talmud.” ‘There are two Talmudim. One com- 
piled in Palestine about 400 c.z. and containing the 
learning of the Palestinian schools is popularly 
known as the “Jerusalem Talmud”; the other com- 
piled in Babylon about 500 c.z. is known as the 
“Babylonian Talmud.” 

The Rabbis regarded the life of man, from the 
cradle to the grave, as a religious service: wholly 
devoted to God. This explains why so large a sec- 
tion of the Talmud deals with religious laws, for 
these embrace almost every action in life. The fix- 
ing of dates of fasts and feasts, the arrangement of 
prayers and sacrifices, and the symbolical details 
connected with rites and ceremonies are all the sub- 
jects of discussion and consideration. 

We read also of laws relating to tithes, laws con- 
cerning jubilee, and hygienic laws for both sexes. : 
All these are considered with profound care and 
deep thought, showing the importance which early 
Jewish thinkers attached to every aspect of life. 
In the course of their determining of various reli- 
gious questions, the Rabbis referred to their know]l- 
edge of mathematics and natural science. They had 
recourse to botany in treating of seeds and to 
zoology in speaking of unclean animals. They 
needed astronomy in preparing the calendar, physi- 


222 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


ology and medicine in treating of various hygienic 
laws, and mechanics and art in describing the 
temple and its architecture. 

We thus see, from our brief sketch of the Talmud, 
that it is a vast storehouse of Rabbinical reflections 
and discussions on thousands of topics treated of 
and touched on in the Bible, a compendium of 
Jewish lore, scientific and legendry, and a vast 
treasury of Jewish speculation and faith. It right- 
fully occupies one of the most distinguished places 
amongst the monuments of the past, and there are 
few works of such elaborate character, discerning 
minuteness, and extended scope inherited from such 
a remote age to be compared with it. To the Jew, 
the Talmud has been throughout the ages his great- 
est molding force; his thoughts and activities have 
been continuously influenced by its teachings. It 
has been to him an encircling ocean, encompassing 
his whole being and penetrating Buely action of his 
daily life. 

Our outline of the development of Jewish tradi- 
tion has shown us the democratic nature on which it 
is based. We have seen that many traditional laws 
originated with the people rather than with the 
legislators. These laws were the expressions of the 
demands of the people and it was merely the func- 
tion of the Rabbis to formulate and limit these 
popular demands. The laws became binding only 
because the people wished them to be so, and the 
Rabbis, in their recognition of the strength of the 





JEWISH TRADITION 223 


public opinion, always advised their pupils to fol- 
low the prevailing custom if in doubt concerning 
the observance of a certain law. But this was only 
possible through the place which the Torah came to 
occupy in the life of the Jew, for as a result of the 
development in Jewish thought and tradition the 
Torah had come to occupy a supreme place of 
importance in every possible aspect of Jewish life. 

The Bibla had come to be known as the constitu- 
tion of the Jewish people, a constitution which could 
be reinterpreted, but to which no essential could 
be added and from which no important subtraction 
could be made. But whilst the Bible formed the 
basic constitution of Judaism, tradition formed the 
commentary on this. Judaism could never have 
maintained itself on a literal fulfillment of the Bible, 
for its growth would have become stunted and its 
development arrested. Jewish tradition was thus 
the great saving force of Judaism, for it was by 
means of tradition that the Torah was vitalized 
and adapted to the ever-changing conditions of life. 
We can thus understand how, after a time, tradi- 
tional customs and observances came to be regarded 
equally as binding as those of the Bible, and hardly 
any line of distinction was drawn between those 
originating from one source and those from another. 
Torah now came to mean not only the five books 
of the Pentateuch but the work of any great teacher 
who had contributed to the upbuilding of Judaism. 
In the words of Schechter: “The conviction was 


224 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


firmly held that everything wise and good, be it 
ethical or ceremonial in its character, whose effect 
would be to strengthen the cause of religion, was 
at least potentially contained in the Torah and that 
it only required an earnest religious mind to find it 
there. Hence the famous adage that everything 
which any student will teach at any future time was 
already communicated to Moses at Mount Sinai; 
or the injunction that any acceptable truth, even if 
discovered by an insignificant man in Israel, should 
be considered as having the authority of a great 
sage or prophet, or even of Moses himself. The 
principle was that the words of the Torah are fruit- 
ful and multiply.” 

But Jewish law was neither settled finally by the 
Mishnah nor the Gemara. As difficulties arose in 
each generation the Rabbis were consulted and it 
was they who gave a final decision. After a time, 
various attempts were made to codify the great 
mass of Jewish traditional law. Amongst these 
one may particularly refer to the Mishnah Torah 
(Second Law) by Maimonides, the Turim by Jacob 
Ben Asher, and the Shulchan Aruch by R. Joseph 
Caro. 





Tradition is the extension of the franchise. Tradition 
means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our 
ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition 
refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of 
those who merely happen to be walking about. All 
Democrats object to men being disqualified by the acci- 
dent of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified 
by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to 
neglect a good man’s opinion even if he is our groom; 
tradition asks us not to neglect a good man’s opinion 
even if he is our father. 


Fospick: Meaning of Faith. 


225 





CHAPTER VIII 


THE AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 


Authority and experiment—As most people advance they seem 
ever ready to learn, to benefit from the knowledge of others, 
to submit themselves to authority—There is a strong rational 
element in the acceptance of tradition—The most extreme 
traditionalism and the most extreme modernism are accepted 
upon authority in the same way—Jews have no external 
authority to which they can turn as a universally recognized 
synod—No form of Jewish life can be said to be traditional 
unless it is fully in harmony with Jewish practice—The tra- 
ditions of old are the very spiritual forces by which our 
ancestors lived—Judaism is a living system of life and can- 
not be expressed in any rigid formula—Traditional Judaism 
is not a dead organism but a living force constantly develop- 
ing and adapting itself to the needs of the age though always 
maintaining a complete unity with Jewish life and thought— 
Theories postulated as to the origin of an institution do not 
affect its importance from a specifically Jewish standpoint. 
—Judaism to many but a godless nationalism. 


Iv is usually thought that authority and experi- 
ment ought to be separated and treated as matters 
entirely apart—the former as part of the life of 
religion, the latter as characteristic of science. We 
are told that in the domains of religion the law is 
laid down for us; in the case of Judaism, for example, 
it comes from the Bible and the teachings of great 
Rabbis, who, we believe, are able to decide ques- 
tions for us. Religion is thus said to be character- 

227 


228 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


ized by authority. A person must either accept 
the instruction he receives or leave it. On the other 
hand, science, we are told, is characterized by free 
experiment in which each man makes his own 
advance untrammeled by tradition, unrestricted by 
any authority. Is this really true? One is reminded 
of the story of the lady who said to Huxley, “Be 
_ very careful what you say, for I shall believe every 
word of it, whatever it is.’ The same lady was prob- 
ably heard saying, a few days later, ‘““Of course you 
religious people go by authority; you believe what 
you are told, but in science we have no authority. 
We only believe what we prove.” This is one of 
the popular contrasts between science and religion. 

There is no doubt that in some respects religion 
is a deference, a humility, a receiving of a great 
message which has come long ago from far aloft. 
It has a communicated word, an entrusted ministry 
which consists of authorized persons to expound it 
who, in teaching, rely upon a body of tradition 
regarded as unchangeable. But does not the author- 
ized scientific teacher follow this method also? 
What would happen to a person who proposed to 
make advances in science or even to acquire the 
elements of a particular science, or of scientific 
method in general, but was not prepared to submit 
himself to authority—to the authority that can 
teach? Would he ever make any progress in his 
work? Surely not. We cannot possibly make any 
real advance without authority, although some 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 229 


people may make some kind of advance with a 
minimum of authority. 

Let us take the following as a typical instance. 
In every village there is a man who has a wonderful 
trick of playing the piano or the organ. He does 
not care for the classics. He has never learned to 
read great music and has never submitted him- 
self to the discipline of the great masters. He simply 
improvises for himself as he goes on. We find him 
charming at the age of ten, charming at twenty-one, 
and continuing like this, for the rest of his life. 
There is no originality, no development, no growth. 
The condition of growth is to have learned the old 
things; the condition of advance is to have been 
subject to the great masters—to have submitted 
one’s self to the treasured achievements of the 
earliest searchers, to make use of the stored treasure 
gained through the ages. In all science training 
is the absolutely indispensable prerequisite for 
genuine originality. 

Suppose a person who is desirous of obtaining a 
knowledge of chemistry were to stand near the door 
of one of the lecture rooms of a university where 
the subject is being taught, and say, “I wish to 
obtain a knowledge of chemistry. I wish to obtain 
information as to the chemical processes which take 
place when certain elements are compounded but I 
shall not enter this lecture room until I am con- 
vinced of a variety of things concerning which I am 
doubtful. Who is this person whom you describe 


230 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


as the professor of chemistry? I don’t believe in his 
credentials. He has certainly never shown me that 
he knows anything about it. I shall wait here until 
he comes out and convinces me that he really knows 
his work, is successful in his methods, and that his 
methods are the most up to date.” The person who 
takes an attitude such as this could never succeed. 
He would continue waiting outside the lecture room 
till mosses would clothe his limbs and he would then 
be no wiser than before. If he is to gain any know!- 
edge whatever, he must make up his mind at the 
outset that he is going to submit himself to author- 
ity. He has to believe that the man who is 
described as the professor of the subject is the 
hero of a hundred fights of investigation and that 
what he does not know for the present on the sub- 
ject 1s not worth knowing. He has to believe that, if 
he comes into the classroom, some knowledge will 
eventually get into his astonishingly thick skull. In 
other words, his first actions must be submissions to 
authority. 

But now when he enters the classroom does he 
immediately commence investigating some of the 
inner secrets of chemical life? No. He is taught to 
handle some common scientific instruments, and 
even there he needs authority to guide him. While 
a man knows little, there is little he has to be taught. 
A few simple words of guidance will show him how 
to handle one or two of the most common instru- 
ments in the chemical laboratory. 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 231 


And so, in every branch of knowledge, there is 
little room for teaching when nothing is known, 
and that is why it is so difficult to teach those who 
know little. But let us go to the other end of the 
scale. Let us imagine ourselves at a gathering of 
distinguished scientists, every one of whom may be 
a man of international repute in his own particular 
field. What kind of atmosphere usually exists at 
such a gathering? Here we find every man asking 
questions of his neighbor, every man gladly sub- 
mitting to the authority of the stored knowledge of 
the next. It is the men who know little who are 
slow to submit,to authority and teaching. The man 
of knowledge feels that his curiosity increases as 
his accomplishments grow. He always feels above 
him a sky of knowledge which has not yet been 
scaled but whose light he can receive. Here and 
there one may meet a person who grows into the 
condition where he regards himself as unteachable 
and wishes others to listen whilst he speaks. But 
that person will never advance. As most people 
advance they seem ever ready to learn, to benefit 
from the knowledge of others—to submit themselves 
to authority. 

We must realize that authority and reason are by 
no means opposed to each other. Authority is not 
a rival and opponent of reason, as many philoso- 
phers, including Balfour, argue. In fact it is from 
authority that reason itself draws its most impor- 
tant premises. Nothing can do greater harm to the 


232 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


cause of truth than a mere lip service to logical 
science after having previously determined fully the 
conclusion at which we desire to arrive. Even in 
the acceptance of authority or, for that matter, mn 
the acceptance of tradition there is.a distinctly 
rational element. 

We are all agreed that human reason is only par- 
tial and imperfect. One has only to recall the gro- 
tesque fancies that, from time to time, have taken 
hold of the finest and brainiest men and led them 
into the grossest illusions to satisfy himself that 
the seat of authority does not lie in the reason. Not 
that we are to throw away reason in matters of 
religion, for while faith is oft times above reason, 
it is by no means contrary to it. The voice of 
reason in religion, however, is not to be always con- 
sidered final and authoritative. Dr. F. J. Hall says: 
“Tt is because authority is valid prior to our reason- 
ing that it is discovered to be credible by reason; 
and it is this prior validity that reason discovers, 
thus establishing the rationality of our dependence 
upon authority. Authority presents truth to the 
mind and does so, none the less really whether it is 
rightly understood or not.” 

It is true that there are some things which one 
may discover for himself and others which he must 
accept because he has neither the opportunity nor 
the leisure to test them for himself. But the accept- 
ance of the latter is not always mere credulity. See- 
ing that I have never had the opportunity of study- 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 233 


ing higher mathematics or physics I am prepared 
to accept all that Einstein teaches concerning the 
subject, because he is generally regarded as the 
greatest living authority on this branch of knowl- 
edge. But my acceptance of this on authority is 
really an intellectual process, because I have only 
agreed to accept this after inquiring into the atti- 
tude of other mathematicians, who are authorities on 
the subject, concerning the work of Einstein. 
Similarly, in the acceptance of tradition there is 
a strong rational element. My acceptance of Jewish 
tradition and Jewish culture means that my studies 
have led me to attach much greater importance to 
this learning and wisdom of the Jewish mind with 
reference to some of the great problems of life and 
religion than I could ever hope to arrive at as a 
result of my own experience and investigations. 
And so, realizing the practical utility of these col- 
lected investigations of my ancestors, I submit to 
their authority as shown in their traditions. I feel 
that it is by no means unreasonable for me to sub- 
mit to this authority, for my studies of Jewish his- 
tory and the development of Jewish thought have 
led me to realize that there is a supernatural force 
molding the destinies of the Jewish people, shap- 
ing and forming their lives and characters. And, as 
the practices which have arisen amongst them are 
the product of the minds of teachers whose work 
shows them to have been divinely inspired, they are 
based upon an unquestionably intelligent authority, 


234 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


a divine authority, and to this I, as a Jew, am pre- 
pared to submit. 

We often hear it said that, for a true development 
of the inner life, one must not be subject to any 
outward restraint. We must strike out along our 
own lines and be true to our own selves. And, inas- 
much as we ourselves, are the active party in all 
things, we are not to be determined by arbitrary 
directions. 

Now, in the first place, we must realize that, how- 
ever much the personal element is centered in every 
individual, yet each man realizes his personality 
among men as a social being. There is an essentially 
social setting of the individual life, and the ethical 
and religious contents of man’s life have been devel- 
oped and have taken form in social relations. Even 
Spencer admits the organic relation and natural 
interplay between the individual and the milieu 
in the midst of which he has grown up. The individ- 
ual finds a standard for comparison and material to 
assimilate as expressed in the personal experiences 
and judgments around him, and he is influenced 
largely by these principles as he strives to realize 
his own religious and ethical ideals. 

We thus see that, for the vast majority, every- 
where and always, the most extreme traditionalism 
and the most extreme modernism are accepted upon 
authority in exactly the same way, although the 
average layman, who has neither the competence 
nor the time to investigate any of his religious prin- 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 238 


ciples at first hand, necessarily accepts at second 
hand such views as he may hold about it on the 
authority of any teacher whose competence he may 
respect and in whose ability and honesty he may 
have confidence. A difficult situation has recently 
arisen in Judaism owing to the fact that religious 
authority has, at times, been misused, and the result 
has been to cause teachers of traditional Judaism to 
be discredited by many. There is a feeling on the 
part of many that, in the name of traditional 
Judaism, much error has been taught, and this 
form of Judaism is widely discarded. Curiously, 
however, with this negative attitude toward the 
Judaism which claims the authority of the past 
there is combined an astonishing readiness to accept, 
with the most naive credulity, the doctrines of new 
teachers, however poorly accredited, provided only 
that they stand definitely apart from such tradition 
as has hitherto prevailed. If Judaism is to pro- 
claim her message in the modern world, not merely 
to the docile children of orthodoxy but to the mul- 
titudes, she needs to recover both the capacity and 
also the moral right to speak with authority, in the 
name of the living God, the authentic message of 
spiritual truth. 

We Jews possess in the tenets and accepted beliefs 
of Judaism a much richer faith than the average Jew 
could find for himself. Jewish tradition and Jewish 
practice present a much more complete scheme of 
things than individually anyone can call his own. 


236 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


The thinking Jew, unwilling to accept the authority 
of tradition, is really confronted with the problem 
of balancing the claims of two rival authorities— 
his own individual experiences and feelings over 
against those of generations of others who have 
preceded him. Is it not wiser for him to regard the 
authority claimed by Jewish tradition as a mold 
into which he can pour the treasures of his own 
religious experience than to reject it entirely? 

In religion, as in every other sphere of human life, 
the individual is molded by the social tradition 
which he inherits, and that authority is the inevi- 
table form under which education and social train- 
ing invariably begin. If the individual is to enter 
into any spiritual inheritance of value, he must 
begin by sitting at the feet of tradition. The Jewish 
layman must realize that Judaism cannot be picked 
up or discovered without guidance. Judaism is a 
definite, positive, historical religion which requires to 
be taught in theory and practice. Authority is the 
necessary form under which any tradition, whether 
of religion or of civilization, must be mediated in the 
first instance to individuals if it is to reach them at 
all. To attempt to cut off Judaism from its old 
historical tradition is simply to cut it off as a his- 
torical religion from its very being. 

Our very attempts to rationalize any religion of 
worth means turning it into something else other 
than itself, for there is more in religion than can 
adequately be grasped by the mind, and this can 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 237 


only be expressed in the language of metaphor and 
symbol. We must realize that every religion, and, 
for that matter, every philosophy, must contain an 
element of permanent inadequacy, and that neither 
Judaism nor any other religion of worth will be 
fully understood if approached in the spirit of a 
Salomon Reinach. 

True religion can never be entirely rational but 
must inevitably be bound with a touch of poetry and 
mysticism. The truly devout Jew realizes, person- 
ally, the feelings of the psalmist, when he exclaimed 
such passages as, “Whom have I in heaven but 
thee?” “And there is not upon earth that I desire 
beside thee’; or, “As the heart panteth after the 
water-brooks so panteth my soul after thee, God!” 

The emotional and mystical elements associated 
with historical Judaism have prevented its being 
influenced by the arid and meager defects of Deism 
or Pantheism. The tribulations and persecutions of 
Israel brought God nearer to His people and created 
a close and mystic affinity between God and the 
people of God. This affinity meant not only that 
God selected Israel for a peculiar mission, but His 
spirit was immanent in their midst and He loved 
them with a peculiar love. The mystic relation 
which existed between God and ancient Israel must 
be replaced by the mystic relation between God and 
every individual Jewish soul. The means by which 
the medieval Kabbalists or modern Chasidim raised 
their souls from mundane things to spiritual com- 


238 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


munion may not appeal to us, but some of them, at 
least, have a lesson for the Western Jew of today. 
The Jewish scholar who aims at achieving an 
intellectual interpretation of Judaism as a whole 
must take account of the whole, and not merely of 
a part, of the tradition of Judaism in its historical — 
development from its very earliest days until now. 
It may be said, “You cannot have it both ways. 
Tradition must be either right or wrong, valuable or 
worthless. Is tradition entitled to carry any weight 
or have any value at all?” The traditionalist 
starts with a bias in favor of tradition, just as the 
self-conscious modernist starts with a bias against it. 
The conservative or orthodox Jew, who observes 
traditional. Jewish ceremonials, is on the whole 
traditionally minded, just as the Jew who holds 
himself aloof from historical Judaism is anti-tradi- 
tional. The scientific value of either of these atti- 
tudes can be realized by our bearing in mind that 
tradition must be constantly sifted, criticized, and 
re-interpreted in relation to our knowledge of the 
world as a whole. The Jewish theologian, starting 
out as a Jew with a bias in favor of Judaism, and 
anxious to test the spiritual value of Jewish tradi- 
tion in the world of today, refuses to believe that the 
faith by which his ancestors have lived for gen- 
erations can be nothing more than an illusion. He 
realizes that the intellectual and rational interpreta- 
tions of many Jewish traditions need to be restated 
and reinterpreted in every age, but this does not 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 239 


necessarily mean that tradition can be defied 
entirely. We must realize that Judaism as a reli- 
gion must always base its appeal on the heart and 
conscience of man, rather than on his intellect, and 
its appeal must always be psychological rather than 
logical. 

Scott Holland says, in his work Logic and Life, 
“Faith is not made by argument. It seeks indeed 
for a rational solution of life’s mysteries; it grows 
through gaining hold of them! The depth said, 
‘It is not in me.’ Not from things without, but from 
the heart within, cometh wisdom; there, in the inner 
places of the soul, in the secret will, with which 
a man fears the Lord and departs from evil, is the 
true place of spiritual understanding.” 

We Jews need an authority which is in its nature 
emancipatory and not repressive, empowering and 
not enfeebling. The object of Jewish faith must 
be the source of Jewish freedom. Judaism can only 
be saved by what saves the soul. 

The modern Jew can commit no greater error than 
to set himself against the codes of tried experience 
of past ages. The doctrines of the past are not only 
men’s formulations but the accumulated verdicts 
of the moral and religious experiences of vast ranges. 
To attempt to emancipate oneself from the restraint 
of such codes is, therefore, the very height of rash- 
ness and folly. A much wiser method for us to 
employ is to make fair trial of them by personal 
interpretation with the conviction that these codes 


240 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


will be understood better as they are lived. If they 
contain the revelation of divine truth of modern 
origin, then the incapacity to perceive and receive 
the doctrine means simply that the age is lacking in 
moral fiber. 

Balfour rightly says, “It is authority rather than 
reason to which, in the main, we owe, not religion 
only, but ethics and politics.” He ridicules the idea 
of a community of which the members should set 
out to examine deliberately the grounds on which 
their moral, religious, and civil life rests. But this 
is what people who refuse the instruction of legal 
and religious codes practically propose. As we have 
already noted, even in the domain of exact science 
it is impossible for the student to obtain his informa- 
tion entirely from his own experience, excluding 
entirely the experience of others. Those who refuse 
to assent to any other authority than that which is 
absolutely final usually fall in with fallible author- 
ities without admitting it. 

Professor Andrew Seth, in dealing with the nature 
of truth, has said: 


The truth is hardly likely to be the final 
truth; it may be taken up and superseded in a 
wider and fuller truth. And, in this way, we 
might pass, in successive cycles of finite exist- 
ence, from sphere to sphere of experience, from 
orb to orb of truth, and even the highest would _ 
still remain a finite truth and fall infinitely — 
short of the truth of God. But such a doctrine 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 241 


of relativity in no way invalidates the truth of 
revelation at any given stage. The fact that 
the truth that I reach is the truth for me does 
not make it, on that account, less true. It is 
true so far as it goes, and if my experience can 
carry me no further, I am justified in treating 
it as ultimate until it is superseded. Should it 
ever be superseded, I shall then see both how it 
is modified by being comprehended in a higher 
truth, and also how it, and no other statement 
of the truth, could have been true at my former 
standpoint. But, before that higher standpoint 
is reached, to seek to discredit’ our present 
insight by the general reflection that its truth 
is partial and requires correction, is a perfectly 
empty truth, which, in its bearing upon human 
life, must also certainly have the effect of an 
untruth. 


Now there are two features by which true author- 
ity can be distinguished. In the first place, real 
authority concerning any branch of knowledge is 
based upon achievement in that field; and, secondly, 
this authority promotes investigation and proof. 
Let us proceed to develop each of these points more 
fully. If I am engaged in the study of history, it is 
useless to ask me to believe that Lincoln lived in the 
fifteenth century because the president of the Mexi- 
can Soap Corporation says so. The president of the 
Mexican Soap Corporation may be a great authority 
on the manufacture of soap, but that does not prove 
he has a knowledge of history. That great authority 


242 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


which belongs to a particular sphere of action must 
not be applied to a sphere which is foreign to his 
field of achievement. 

There have been times when people were ready to 
submit their convictions to the decrees of kings, 
just as there have been times when people were 
willing to submit their religious actions to the 
exigencies of party politics. There have been times 
when people were willing to deny what they knew 
scientifically to be true because an authority based 
on achievement in quite another field refused to 
accept the conclusions. We thus see that real 
authority is based upon achievement in the field 
where it proposes to exercise itself. I cannot accept 
the dictates of my mother-in-law in the choice of an 
automobile if all her life she has been engaged in the 
study of domestic economy. It is necessary for us to 
realize this at the outset, because a great deal of the 
prejudice against authority, particularly in the field 
of religion, has been due to the fact that people have 
called by the name of authority an authority which 
was not valid because it belonged to a different field 
of knowledge or of action. A man may be a great 
authority in handling test-tubes or in counting up 
inches and millimeters, but that does not prove that 
he has the slightest idea as to how to consider the 
nature and interest of conscience. 

Secondly, true authority promotes investigation 
in every possible way. When a religion is supposed 
to be sacred in such a way that one must not inquire 


b 


t 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 243 


as to how it was made or what it means, or con- 
cerning the functions of its ceremonials, but must 
take it or leave it, then that religion somehow bears 
the mark of imposture. Beware of it! 

In other aspects of life we are constantly told that 
a person must, so to speak, get into the water first 
and learn to swim there, that he must open his eyes 
first and find the light thus; but when it comes to 
religion many people expect to have the knowledge 
of it injected into them while they are asleep, while 
they are actually refusing to attend or looking the 
other way, or while they even maintain an irreverent 
attitude toward it. 

The man who says, “You people are always talk- 
ing about God. I don’t believe any such thing. 
I’ve never seen him and I’m not interested in his 
existence. Why should I believe in a God whom I’ve 
never seen and whom I don’t know. If you have 
one, show him to me, let me see him’—the person 
who comes to this or any other kind of investiga- 
tion in such a state of mind cannot hope to succeed. 
He must not be surprised that he has no fortune in 
a search conducted with an irreverence which is fatal 
and on the assumption that there is nothing to look 
for. 

If I were given a cup which I believed to contain 
a lump of white hot metal I should certainly not 
put my naked fingers in to feel it. But why put 
tongs in when I am not sure there is anything hot 
in it? I should put in it the type of thing which 


244 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


will be appropriate in case there is anything hot. 
Similarly, the mind which draws near to God must 
be the kind of mind which will be appropriate in 
case God reveals himself. He that comes near to 
God must be a believer that He is, and that He is 
a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. And 
if he, in this half-belief which the wider experience 
of the world already justifies, which is fostered by 
authority, and which echoes in his heart because of 
the great revelations of the past, searches God in this 
spirit, he will certainly find Him. 

Even so critical a scholar as Robertson Smith, 
referring indirectly in one of his works to the value 
of tradition, says: 


Behind the positive religions which trace their 


origin to the teachings of great religious Inno-: 


vators, who spoke as the organs of a divine 
revelation, lies the body of religious usage and 
belief which cannot be traced to the influence of 
individual minds. No primitive religion that 
has moved men has been able to start with a 
tabula rasa. A new scheme of faith can find a 
hearing only by appealing to religious instincts 
and susceptibilities that exist in the minds of 
the audience, and it cannot reach these with- 
out taking account of the traditional forms in 
which all religious feeling is embodied and with- 
out speaking a language which men accustomed 
to these old forms can understand. .. . The 
precepts of the Pentateuch did not create a 
priesthood and a sacrificial service on an alto- 


) 
! 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 245 


gether independent basis, but only reshaped or 
remodeled, in accordance with a more spiritual 
doctrine, institutions of an older type which in 
many particulars were common to the Hebrews 
with their heathen neighbors. Everyone who 
reads the Old Testament with attention is struck 
with the fact that the origin and rationale of 
sacrifice are nowhere fully explained; that sac- 
rifice as an essential part of religion is taken for 
granted as something which is not a doctrine 
peculiar to Israel but is universally admitted 
and acted on without as well as within the 
limits of the chosen people.* 


As we look around us we see unfortunately that 
we have no external authority to which we can turn 
as a universally recognized synod for fixing the 
norm of Jewish practice and standardizing its devel- 
opment. But if there is no such visible external 
standard, then instead of each one following his indi- 
vidual caprice and norm, a unifying authority can 
be found in what Dr. Schechter calls “the collective 
conscience of catholic Israel as embodied in the uni- 
versal synagogue.” Each age must decide for itself 
its standard of observance, based obviously on the 
idea of a continuous Jewish tradition. It is true 
that for the average individual to learn what this 
universally accepted practice is, 1s no easy matter. 
On the one hand it may appear that it 1s only the 
scholar with a knowledge of the history of any 


See Religion of the Semites, Intro. 


246 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Jewish practice and of its progress and development 
who can be competent to express such an opinion; 
but in practice it will be found that no such scien- 
tific knowledge is necessary, and even the average 
individual Jew need have no difficulty in deciding 
what is recognized Jewish practice by bearing in 
mind the following principles: (1) We can only 
apply our criterion of recognized usage in the case 
of those Jews who have still remained loyal to 
traditional Judaism; the opinions of those who find 
no continuity in Jewish tradition and Jewish 
thought and practices and who deny the validity of 
Jewish law cannot possibly be taken as our stand- 
ard. (2) The practices of those Jews who have 
entirely broken with Jewish tradition cannot obvi- 
ously be taken as a standard for its development. 

No form of Jewish life can be said to be tradi- 
tional unless it is fully in harmony with catholic 
Jewish thought and practice. In other words, only 
those forms of thought or practice can be described 
as Jewish which are fully in harmony with the 
Judaism of the past and establish with it one organic 
whole. 

It is the living word, the living ceremonials and 
practices in our synagogues from ages past, which 
are to be considered and adhered to, yes, even criti- 
cized if you will, rather than the dead written 
formule which embody these practices in writing. 
Even in our scientific investigations into the history 
and development of Jewish practice, in our attempts 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 247 


to probe into the basic psychology of Jewish cere- 
monials, we must carry with us a doctrine of tradi- 
tion which, though not contained in theological 
formule, is still of the utmost importance for our 
understanding of Jewish thought. We must 
recognize everywhere a tradition, a handing down, 
that has been going on at all times, not only in the 
sphere of facts and statements, but also in the minds 
of those who reported the facts and made the state- 
ments. It is true that here and there we may recog- 
nize certain preconceived notions and ideas by which 
the views and statements of our ancestors were 
modified and colored, but to us as Jews there is no 
such thing as a divorce between Judaism and Jewish 
tradition. They stand side by side. The traditions 
of old are not merely written accounts of certain 
formule or customs as embodied in the Jewish 
codes; they are much more. They are the very 
spiritual forces by which our ancestors lived and 
had their being. Man does not live by bread nor by 
meaningless ceremonial. The secret spirituality of 
our fathers lay in the fact that in their Ghetto syna- 
gogues, with no grace of structure and little dignity 
of ceremonial, there lay the greatest of all Jewish 
tradition—the spirit of Jewish life and thought 
which has been passed on throughout the ages and 
has been the means of preserving our sacred heritage. 

The traditional Jew thus comes to the synagogue 
not merely as a theist but asa Jew. His Judaism is 
to him not only a religion of the fleeting present but 


248 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


also of the past. The great past of Israel and the 
glorious future which awaits it, the saints and 
martyrs of former days, and the thinkers and 
philosophers of the future stand before him sum- 
moning him to join hands in one great cause. 

The first command of the decalogue, “I am the 
Lord thy God,” teaches the Jew of the existence of 
a personal God who did not withdraw from the 
world after having completed the work of creation: 
nor is He the transcendent deity who, having fin- 
ished His task, is no longer concerned with its fate 
and destiny, but a God who loves the beings He has 
created and cares and watches over them. This 
command of the decalogue is thus to us of para- 
mount importance. It means that we can bring 
to the God in whom we believe our difficulties and 
our temptations. And although we cannot see Him 
face to face, our limited conception of Him is such 
that we can regard Him as a personal God whose 
relations to us are personal. And it is to this per- 
sonal God in whom we implicitly trust that we can 
bring our trials and tribulations. 

To the Jew, God’s oneness thus signifies absolute 
singleness and His entire difference from all manner 
of being—material, mental, or spiritual. This is the 
distinguishing peculiarity of Jewish monotheism. 
All other forms of being are mere semblances in com- 
parison with Him. The belief in a God, single, 
incomparable with everything in heaven and earth, 
cannot permit the intercession of an elevated human 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 249 


being between God and man such as forms the basis 
of the creed of our neighbors. 

Now, the main basis of Jewish thought and prac- 
tice is the Torah—the Pentateuch. This has been 
and always will remain the root of traditional Jew- 
ish Life. The modern mind may feel itself here 
confronted with a difficulty, for it may. be asked 
how it is compatible with modern thought for us 
to postulate an unchangeable divine Torah, given to 
us millenniums ago, as the basis of every aspect of 
life for all time. Jewish tradition, however, now 
comes to our aid and by leaving the practical appli- 
cation and interpretation of the Torah to the true 
representatives of the Jewish people it assists in 
making the Torah a living force to the Jew of all 
ages. 

An erroneous impression has been obtained 
through the wrong translation of Torah by the word 
“law.” The correct meaning of Torah is doctrine. 
The Torah was to every Jew in ancient times a liv- 
ing body of doctrine. Every section of Jewry— 
rich and poor alike—were thus able to devote them- 
selves to its study. This probably also accounts for 
the fact that a real proletariat never existed in 
Israel. The poor man, engaged in the most fatigu- 
ing labor, could also lead the life of a scholar. 
Amidst his arduous labors in earning a living the 
poor Jew would still find some time—very fre- 
quently even during the late hours of the night— 
for the study of Jewish literature. This in itself 


250 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


had some very important effects. The possession 
of a knowledge of the Torah by all types of Jews 
meant the impossibility of a clerical body possessed 
of a monopoly of learning. There was no caste 
system in Jewry, and when the old priestly order 
disappeared the only division of section was that 
into scholars—diligent students of the Torah—and 
non-scholars. Another effect of the profound learn- 
ing in Israel was that no distinction could be drawn 
between faith and knowledge. Religion did not 
mean to the Jew faith in some precious treasures 
which he was forbidden to know. On the other 
hand, faith was always conceived in consonance with 
knowledge. Ignorance could not be suffered in the 
nation. In our daily prayers we include the Tal- 
mudic precept that the study of doctrine outweighs 
all commandments. 

To the Rabbis the study of the Torah was in itself 
a form of worship. They regarded the whole state 
of man as a state of culture and its flowering and 
completion as religion or worship. To them religion 
was no philosophic theorem but an ever-active 
impulse radiating out into all the activities of life. 

We thus see that Judaism cannot be expressed in 
any rigid formula. It is a living system of life 
responding to the highest demands of every Jewish 
heart and to the needs of every Jewish mind. And 
the Jew of each age may lay special emphasis on 
those aspects of Jewish thought and doctrine which 
are brought into prominence by the intellectual 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 251 


representatives of that time. Jewish thought has 
been based on the belief that dogma and conduct 
are not to be placed into two separate and water- 
tight compartments, but must always work in 
unison. As life advanced and became more complex 
the law was reinterpreted to meet its varying con- 
ditions. But whilst the Rabbis always attempted to 
modify Jewish law in accordance with the ever- 
changing conditions of Jewish’ life, and even abro- 
gated certain laws when necessity arose, they never 
claimed authority over man’s intellect or conscience. 
We have a Jewish law and Jewish philosophers, but 
no systems of philosophy binding for all time. As 
science advances and the intellectual outlook of the 
Jew together with that of his gentile neighbor pro- 
gresses with it, there is no necessity for him to vary 
his mode of prayer or his daily ceremonial observ- 
ances in accordance with the ever-changing theories 
of scientific thought. If, as we have noted, the Jew- 
ish form of prayer in the synagogue and Jewish cere- 
monial observances are the expression of the uni- 
versal catholic conscience of Israel, and have been 
adopted. as a means of uniting and unifying the 
various scattered elements of Jewry, then it would 
merely bring about utter chaos for each group of 
individuals to modify their form of prayer or their 
ceremonial observances in accordance with their own 
individual sympathies or feelings with utter disre- 
gard to their effect on the catholic sentiment of 
world-wide Jewry. Judaism would be thus reduced 


252 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


to a shadow of its former self and would no longer 
be worthy of the name it bears. 

Traditional Judaism is, therefore, not the dead 
organism its opponents represent it to be, but a liv- 
ing force constantly developing and adapting itself 
to the needs and the requirements of the age, 
though always maintaining a complete unity with 
Jewish life and Jewish thought. There has always 
been a continuous process of development and 
change in the thought of the Jew. The Judaism of 
the Bible, the Judaism of the Talmud, and the 
Judaism of the twentieth-century traditional Jew 
are, in some respects, three different types of Juda- 
ism, though they are entirely the result of one con- 
tinuous process of development. For example, the 
Rabbis of the Talmud, feeling the severity of many 
biblical laws, either abrogated them by a legal fiction 
where necessity demanded or mollified their severity. 
Thus, capital punishment was made almost entirely 
impossible; whilst such laws as that in Deuteronomy 
concerning the putting to death of a rebellious son 
were put beyond the bounds of possibility. 

Similarly, the advances in science and philosophy 
have resulted in considerable development in Jew- 
ish doctrine as well as in their application. In Jew- 
ish dogma the main development which has taken 
place since Bible times is the belief in immortality. 
Even in the time of the early portions of the Bible 
this conception must have been known in Israel. 
Later, in the Book of Psalms, we meet with expres- 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 253 


sions which show clearly that the soul’s immortality 
was no unfamiliar doctrine. The seventeenth psalm, 
after referring with disdain to the prosperity of 
“Men of the world who have their portion in this 
life,”.ends with the words, “As for me, I will behold 
thy face by righteousness. I shall be satisfied, when 
I awake, with thy likeness.” In psalm sixteen, 
which is recited in the house of mourning, we read, 
“My heart is glad and my glory rejoiceth; my flesh 
also shall rest in hope. For Thou wilt not leave my 
soul in the grave, neither wilt Thou suffer Thine 
holy one to see corruption. Thou wilt show me the 
path of life; in thy presence is fullness of joys; at 
thy right hand there are pleasures forevermore.” 
The last chapter of Ecclesiastes, in reply to the 
scepticism of the preceding portions of the book, 
ends with the words, ‘“Then shall the dust return to 
the earth as it was; and the spirit shall return unto 
God who gave it.” These are but a few of the pas- 
sages in the Bible showing the belief in the ever- 
lastingness of the human spirit. There was no form 
of pronouncement, however, in this belief until the 
time of the Rabbis, and even they expressed no clear 
distinction as to whether material resurrection or 
spiritual immortality is meant. Later, Maimonides 
and other medieval Jewish philosophers definitely 
interpreted these references to resurrection in terms 
of immortality and assigned them a fundamental 
place amongst the essentials of Jewish belief. 

It is necessary for us to note also that the theories 


254 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


postulated as to the origin or mode of growth of an 
institution do not in the slightest affect its impor- 
tance to us from a specifically Jewish standpoint. 
For example, scientific criticism may prove an insti- 
tution to have arisen under the most debased, 
idolatrous, and anti-Hebraic or anti-Jewish circum- 
stances, but if as a result of centuries of growth and 
development this institution has won for itself so 
great a place in catholic Jewish sentiment and 
thought that itis universally accepted by Jewry as 
full of spiritual meaning and value, so that, apart 
from its historic associations, 1t 1s to us an expres- 
sion of our spiritual needs, then the institution is 
Jewish and as part of Jewish thought and life must 
be conserved. 

For example, one Jewish theologian, in an essay on 
the origin and function of ceremonies in Judaism, 
after explaining the meaning of the Oriental cus- 
tom of removing one’s shoes, proceeds to explain 
the Jewish practice of not entering a place of wor- 
ship bareheaded. He says, “It is regarded as dis- 
respectful in the East to receive, or to be seen by, 
strangers bareheaded, and it stands to reason that it 
is considered by Orientals still more derogatory to 
the honor of God to stand bareheaded before Him 
in prayer or in sight of the sanctuary.” He then 
continues, “You observe at once the pivotal ques- 
tion at issue: Are we, as Jews, in Occidental life to 
be Orientals in the house of God or are we Occi- 
dentals in every respect?” In other words, this 





AUTHORITY OF JEWISH TRADITION 255 


writer means to suggest that as we Jews are Occi- 
dentals in every aspect of life outside of the syna- 
gzogue we ought to be Occidental in the synagogue 
also. Is this really true? Can we Jews truly say 
that, even merely as a religious body, we are entirely 
Occidental in every respect? Surely, even the mini- 
mum of ceremonialism, to which many of us have 
cut down our religion and the few festivals to which 
we ocasionally adhere, are not Occidental but 
Oriental. Judaism itself is an Oriental religion. It 
arose in the East, its’sources are to be traced to 
Eastern thought and life; its great prophets whose 
teachings many of us emphasize so strongly were 
Orientals; and its ceremonials are based on historical 
narratives connected with an Oriental people. No! 
Our adherence to the practice of the wearing of the 
hat in the synagogue and similar customs is unaf- 
fected by their historical origin. We are merely 
interested in the fact that this, and similar practices, 
are So inwoven in Jewish life and thought that we 
have a right to regard them as neither Oriental nor 
Occidental, but as Jewish. Once a practice has been 
made Jewish by history it cannot be disregarded but 
must command our respect regardless of any scien- 
tific criticism against it. 

We are sometimes told that Judaism is so wide 
and so all-embracing that it can include almost 
every type of thought so long as its basis is pure 
monotheism. And it has become particularly 
fashionable nowadays for many Jews, to whom 


256 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Judaism means “Jewish Nationalism,” devoid of 
all religion, to cite such a Talmudic passage as 
“Even if a Jew has sinned, he still remains a Jew,” 
in order to show how liberal the Rabbis of old were 
toward those who were not observant of Jewish prac- 
tice in their time. How foolish! The Declaration 
of Independence, emphasizing the equality of all 
men, is the great charter of American liberty, yet we 
have, in this country, an organization known as the 
Ku Klux Klan, consisting solely of those who con- 
sider themselves as one-hundred-percent Americans, 
standing for what they regard as pure Americanism 
and yet acting in a manner which is contrary to the 
very basic principles of American thought. True, 
the Jew who has divested himself of all Jewish reli- 
gious practices still remains a Jew racially, but his 
whole mode of life is certainly unJewish, just as the 
members of the Ku Klux Klan are still Americans 
although the basis of their organization is contrary 
to the fundamental principles of American thought. 

We must realize, once for all, that Judaism cannot 
be modified day after day and hour after hour so 
as to satisfy the fads and fancies of every type of 
individual. One cannot be everything if one wishes 
to be anything. We cannot eliminate from Judaism 
its essentials of faith and hope and make it so 
flexible as to adapt itself to every type of circum- 
stance, nor are we rendering a service to Judaism or 
to ourselves by describing it as a kind of enlightened 
hedonism or moderate epicureanism. 





“Give me a theme,” the little poet cried, 
“And I will do my part.” 

“°?Tis not a theme you need,” the world replied; 
“You need a heart.” 


R. W. Gitper: Wanted A Theme. 


257 





CHAPTER IX 


SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR FORM OF SERVICE? 


Spiritual condition of Jewry similar to the Rome of the second 
century—No central authority—Modern notion of mental 
progress—Final evidence of religion is a psychological one— 
—Two opposite conceptions of Judaism recently evolved— 
Meaning of authority in Judaism—God and Torah—Judaism 
cannot be expressed in any rigid formula—Prayer the expres- 
sion of the universal catholic conscience of Israel—Tradi- 
tional Judaism a living organism—Dissatisfaction with the 
traditional prayerbook—The value of religious ceremonies and 
exercise of imagination—Emotional value of religion—Koi 
Nidrei—Significance of Hebrew in our service. 


THe spiritual condition of Jewry today reminds 
one of the racy description of Lucian of the Rome 
of the second century. The old beliefs were dying 
and their place was being taken by some of the most 
ridiculous notions. The empire was simply full of 
impostors and soothsayers, prophets and jugglers, of 
every description, whose success was in direct pro- 
portion to their pretension and effrontery. Simi- 
larly, in Jewry today all sorts of quack remedies are 
proposed as a means of curing our spiritual ills. The 
great tragedy of Jewish life is the fact that there is 
everywhere a breaking away from the ancient Jewish 
landmarks, without anything being done to replace 

259 


260 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


them. The spiritual basis of Jewish life is being 
everywhere destroyed and we are at present without 
a central authority which can command the 
allegiance of traditional Jewry. 

The problem of the preservation of Judaism seems 
today greater than ever it was. With the bond of 
control so relaxed as it is today; with our traditional 
practice so shaken; with the mind of the average 
Jewish layman so hungry and yet so poor, so 
interested and yet so distracted upon final problems; 
with the rising generation in independence, till in an 
evil sense the child is father of the man; and with 
the rising classes so ignorant of responsibility, the 
necessity for us to learn the lesson of obedience is 
now more urgent than ever. It has rightly been 
said: 


The vice of the modern notion of mental 
progress is that it is always somehow concerned 
with the breaking of bonds, the effacing of 
boundaries, the casting away of dogmas. But 
if there be such a thing as mental growth, it 
must mean the growth into more and more 
definite convictions, into more and more dog- 
mas. The human brain is a machine for coming 
to conclusions; if it cannot come to conclusions 
it is rusty. When we hear of a man too clever 
to believe, we are hearing of something having 
almost the character of a contradiction in terms. 
It is like hearing of a nail that was too good to 
hold down a carpet, or a bolt that was too strong 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 261 


to keep a door shut. ... If then, there is to 
be a mental advance, it must be a mental 
advance in the construction of a philosophy of 
life. And that philosophy of life must be right 
and the others wrong. 


Like the ship that has lost its compass and strays 
as chance and wind direct, many a Jew wanders 
haphazard through the space formerly occupied by 
God and Jewish tradition and now rendered a desert 
by modern thought and rationalism. He has lost his 
faith and with it his hopes. What is to be done? 
How is a feeling for Judaism to be brought into the 
hearts of the Jewish people? We are told that men 
must be brought back to Jewish study and worship, 
but the real end of worship is not to root men in 
tradition or to drill them in theology and logic. It 
is to find the mystic chord which vibrates to the 
breath of the Unseen, to develop the spiritual sense 
in men. Bible, tradition, history, and theology all 
have their religious uses, but it is not upon any of 
them that religion ultimately rests. The final evi- 
dence of religion is a psychological one. It rests 
not on what man has done but on what man is. We 
might compare in many respects the part played by 
the spiritual sense in relation to religion to that 
played by the musical sense in relation to its world. 
We know of a history of music and a logic of music, 
but the true musical sense is not an answer of the 
intellect but a deep thrill of consciousness which, as 
the harmonic sense develops, becomes more vividly 


262 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


conscious of the reality that answers to it. Similarly, 
religion mingles with reason, but is nevertheless as 
remote from it as is the emotion raised by a 
Beethoven sonata. Affluence of ideas and wealth of 
philosophical thought are excellent things in reli- 
gion, but these are not the only or the highest things 
necessary. The success of the teacher does not 
depend on his intellectual range but on his relation 
to the spiritual world. 

Two opposite conceptions of Judaism have 
recently been evolved. On the one hand we have an 
extreme rationalist camp acknowledging only the 
racial character of the Jew, on the other hand a 
school of Judaism acknowledging only the reli- 
gious conceptions of the Jewish faith. On the one 
hand many Jews endeavor to strip Judaism of 
all its national elements and to preserve it merely as 
a religious denomination. On the other hand we 
have the Jew who, having lost all his religious 
affiliations, still feels himself knitted to the Jewish 
people by strong racial sentiments and desires the 
preservation of his people as a racial entity. 

We must realize at the outset that Judaism can- 
not be described as a creed in the modern sense of 
the term, which implies something foreign and exter- 
nal to man’s own knowledge and received only in 
deference to the weight of authority. When the 
medieval Jewish philosophers formulated the prin- 
ciples of Judaism so as to give certain beliefs a 
standing similar to that held by the “dogmas” of the 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 263 


Christian church, they were faced with considerable 
opposition. Moses Mendelssohn, in his Jerusalem, 
argues that Judaism has no “symbolical books” or 
“articles of faith,” and it never commanded the Jews 
to believe but rather “to know” and “to recognize.” 

Judaism certainly does not insist on blind adher- 
ence to authority. When Moses was asked to restrain 
Eldad and Medad from prophesying in the camp, 
his reply—which has rightly been described as the 
very essence of freedom of thought—was, “Would 
that all the people of the Lord were prophets.” 
There are no ready-made beliefs in Judaism which 
one must blindly accept. As Mendelssohn points 
out, the basis of Judaism is reason and understand- 
ing, for the Bible never commands one to believe but 
merely says “Thou shalt do” and “Thou shalt not 
do.” 

When we speak of authority in Judaism we mean 
something entirely different from that interpreted 
as authority in other religions. Judaism has 
no definite dogmas and no pope who can lay down 
the law. There is no Jewish church and there are no 
Jewish sacraments. There are no articles of faith 
in which the Jew must believe if he is to be saved, 
for Judaism on the contrary attaches the utmost 
importance to thought and study. Liberty of 
thought and liberty of speech are the inherent rights 
of every Jew. 

Let us now proceed to consider the question of the 
reform of the ritual. The Jewish philosophical con- 


264 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


ception of prayer is beautifully explained in Jehuda 
Halevi’s Al Khazari. “Why should a man recite his 
prayer for a multitude in a multitude? Would not 
a man’s soul be purer and his mind less abstracted 
if he were to recite his prayers for himself?” are the 
questions asked. Then comes the reply: “A person 
who prays for himself is like one who retires alone 
into his house, refusing to assist his fellow citizens 
in the repair of their walls. Huis expenditure is as 
great as his loss. He, however, who joins the major- 
ity spends little yet remains in safety, because one 
replaces the defect of the other. It is interesting to 
note that Plato describes what is expended on behalf 
of the law as, the ‘portion of the whole.’ The 
individual who neglects that portion of the whole 
which is the basis of the wealth of the common- 
wealth, of which he forms a part, in the belief that 
he does better in spending it on himself, sins against 
the commonwealth and more against himself .. . for 
the relation of the individual to the commonwealth 
is as the relation of the single limb to the body. 
Among actions this is represented by Sabbath, Holy 
Days... and similar institutions. Among words it 
is prayer, blessings, and thanksgivings.”’ 

According to the Jewish idea in prayer the individ- 
ual must always feel himself linked to the rest of 
his brethren. This was the reason why the Rabbis 
spoke of the synagogue as being the only place 
where prayer is truly heard and emphasized. Also, 
no man should be away from the house of worship 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 265 


at the time when the congregation is at prayer, for 
that is the most acceptable time for worship. 

It is of importance to note that, after an unbroken 
development of about two thousand years, the tra- 
ditional synagogue service remains uniform except 
for some slight variances of minhag, or custom. 
During the period of the second Temple one of the 
main functions of the ritual was to unite Israel in 
the Diaspora by focusing the eyes of all Jews 
throughout their dispersion upon the great religious 
center of their people. In order that every Jew 
should feel that he had contributed his mite 
toward the rites of the national sanctuary, 1t was 
arranged that the cost of the daily sacrifices was to 
be provided from public funds. Whilst the Temple 
was still in existence groups of Israelites used to 
meet together outside of Jerusalem and read pas- 
sages from the Bible, whilst assemblies and meetings 
for prayer were held on all important occasions. 
Side by side with the Temple worship there was, 
therefore, another form of service in existence which 
was able to replace it and perform its function when 
the terrible catastrophe took place in 70 cz. When 
the temple was in existence the priests used to 
retire every morning and hold a short service, which 
forms the nucleus of our present morning service. 

Our dissatisfaction with the traditional prayer- 
book is due, in great measure, to the fact that we 
fail to remember that public worship is a vehicle 
for the common needs and aspirations of the Jewish. 


266 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


people. Our synagogue service is primarily the 
expression of collective Israel. Amongst the many 
prayers we recite publicly in the synagogue service, 
it is only natural that there should be some which do 
not respond to our individual moods as readily as 
others. But here and there our heart may become 
aglow by some phrase in the liturgy, and we may 
be suddenly moved to a feeling of the greatness of 
the divine. We cannot expect that prayers which 
have been specially arranged and designed for pub- 
lic worship should, on every occasion, satisfy the 
sentiments of each individual congregant. It 1s 
the feelings and sentiments of Jewry as a whole 
which we must think of and consider in preference 
to our own individual feelings. 

We cannot accept the individualistic standpoint 
which measures every aspect and detail of Jewish 
thought and life by its own whims and caprices, 
and we must realize that all our efforts to change 
the service will prove fruitless unless we come to the 
synagogue imbued with deeper spirituality. In the 
words of one Jewish teacher: 


You,may modernize the prayer-book as much 
as you. please, you may remove all of its 
anachronisms, its supplications for the restora- 
tion of the sacrificial rite, its petitions for Zion, 
its anthropomorphisms, but you will not, 
thereby, insure prayerful feeling. This only 
the worshipper himself can supply; and he can 
supply it only if he bear the elements of it in 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 267 


his own breast—in his faith in the Unseen, 
and his desire to surrender himself to the 
Unseen. It is because people forget this funda- 
mental truth that so many unmerited accusa- 
tions are brought against our public worship. 
They condemn the service when they ought 
rather to condemn themselves. They leave the 
synagogue unrefreshed, unhelped—to use their 
own expressions—urritated, alienated. But they 
do not see that much of this failure is charge- 
able on their own lack of devoutness, their own 
want of spiritual preparedness, or a frame of 
mind, cold, sceptical, unresponsive, which 
would suffice to make even the ideal service 
uninspiring and barren. 


It is true, of course, that many a modern mind 
feels that some of the prayers in the traditional 
prayer-book need reinterpretation, but this can 
be done without difficulty by each individual 
Jew. Is it not preferable for our form of worship 
to remain, at least for the present, and for each 
individual Jew to satisfy his personal demands by 
modifying his interpretation so that it will be fully 
in accordance with his own intellectual require- 
ments? For example, no modern Jew feels that he 
would care to see the restoration of sacrifices 
in the Palestine of tomorrow. But this should not 
cause any difficulty, for surely the words of the 
prayer-book, used throughout the Diaspora by 
catholic Israel and hallowed by generations as a 


268 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


means of uniting all the divergent elements of scat- 
tered Jewry, can still be retained by us with a modi- 
fied interpretation and explained as expressing our 
age-long desire for the restoration of a national form 
of worship in our ancient homeland. 

The true functions of the synagogue are best sum- 
marized in the words of Solomon (I Kings viii.). 
It was to be a house for the name of the Lord, 
God of Israel, and there was placed the ark wherein 
is the covenant of the Lord which he made with our 
fathers, when he brought them out of the land of 
Egypt. The synagogue is thus, in the first instance, 
the central place of worship for the scattered con- 
gregations of Israel. It is the means of uniting the 
different links of Israel into a unity with the aid 
of a common prayer-book. Certain expressions in 
that book may make little or no appeal to this or 
that member of the congregation, but of this we can 
take no regard, for it may be due, in most instances, 
to his inability to appreciate the true function of the 
synagogue. 

In no religion does the language of the liturgy lay 
claim to scientific exactness, and when our scientific 
knowledge comes along and proves it inexact, we 
admit the charge. The traditional Jew realizes that 
the function of religion is to appeal to the imagina- 
tion, and conscious as he is of the fact that the 
language of the liturgy cannot always pretend to 
scientific exactness, he prefers to leave something 
to the imagination. 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 269 


Furthermore, we must learn to appreciate and 
understand fully the symbolic meaning of Jewish 
practice and ceremonial. Imagination has played 
and always will play a most important part in the 
building up of our religious ideas. The power of 
imagining—what the Germans call Hinbildungskraft 
—has been a most potent factor in every religion. 
Does not our religious vocabulary, no matter what 
aspect of theological thought to which we are 
attached, consist almost entirely of images? 

Abstract ideas can never satisfy the soul longing 
for God, nor can doctrine alone bring it in touch with 
the great source of all love and wisdom. It is only 
by means of religious acts that our emotions are 
aroused and our spiritual faculties developed. Cere- 
monies are our great educators, for they express to 
all of us alike the universal language of faith and 
loyalty. They are the very poetry of religion invest- 
ing life with the beauty of holiness. Mortal man 
cannot do without signs and symbols to remind him 
of his duty. The sceptic, unmoved by argument, is 
nevertheless moved to tears by the performance of 
some ceremonial act which recalls to his mind various 
long-forgotten memories connected therewith. It is 
absurd to argue that most ancient ceremonials are 
obsolete and unnecessary and what we require is the 
removal of their outward restraint and compulsion. 
For surely an examination and analysis of ourselves 
suggests that even our greater needs are these cere- 
monies as incentives and inner motives giving sanc- 


270 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


tity and concentration to life. Before we throw over 
some of these ancient forms let us attempt to dis- 
cover the secret of their vitality and determine 
whether the growing opposition to many traditional 
Jewish practices is not merely a by-product of the 
force of ignorance. 

The word “ceremony” is connected with the Latin 
caerimonia, which means reverence and awe, whilst 
the plural caerimoniae is a term used to denote reli- 
gious rites which were in ancient Rome of a magical 
character. Ceremonies are not mere playful crea- 
tions of individuals. They are, to man in his primi- 
tive stage, a real method of worship. To him the 
ceremony itself constitutes religion. When he 
advances, however, to a stage of civilization he 
begins to realize that the ceremony is but a means 
to an end. 

The religious ceremony, however, is an indis- 
pensable form of expressing the religious feelings 
prompted by the various events of life. The reli- 
gious cravings of man can never be satisfied by mere 
abstract truths or ethical practices. Man needs the 
religious ceremonial to impress him with the near- 
ness of the Divine. He needs ceremonies which can 
outwardly express his thoughts and feelings, whilst 
they inwardly hallow and enrich his life. Religious 
acts awaken the sense of duty in man, for they 
develop his spiritual faculties and appeal to his 
emotional nature. ‘They are the educators and 
monitors of the people; for to all alike, young and 





per | Bae eee 


SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 271 


old, simple and sage, they speak the language of 
faith and hope. 

Ceremonial means the outward adornment of a 
function which helps to express its significance or 
add to its impressiveness. It is employed on almost 
all important occasions and in every department of 
life. We shake hands, bow, and take off our hats, 
and we mean these actions to express something 
that is in our minds. Some people do these things 
elaborately and make much of them; others just go 
through with them because they are customary. 
In the same way many people enjoy the organized 
parade of a state function or a mass demonstration, 
but others are not interested in the slightest degree. 
Yet ceremonial, in one form or another, does in fact 
appeal to nearly everyone. For the same reason the 
Jew makes use of ceremonial in his religion, as a 
help to worship and a method of adding to the 
impressiveness of the service. 

We are all agreed that some sort of ceremonial 
must be employed in almost every form of human 
activity, and a brief survey of our daily habits will 
show us that it is practically impossible to perform 
any action repeatedly and habitually without acquir- 
ing a set manner of performing it; in addition to the 
doing of the thing there is the question, “How is 
it to be done?” A simple instance from everyday 
life will illustrate this point. Dinner is a universal 
human institution, with marked ceremonies attend- 
ing it. We all lay the table in much the same way; 


272 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


knives and forks, plates and dishes, each have pretty 
much their own regular places on the board and 
their own regular methods of use; and, in every 
ordinary household, the pudding is reserved until 
the meat course has been finished and the guest is 
served before the members of the family. We may 
not be conscious of the fact, but, in truth, the eating 
of our dinner involves us in a most elaborate and 
detailed system of ceremonial. The same applies 
to public worship. Certain things have to be done 
and it is impossible to avoid certain ways of doing 
them. The question, fundamentally, is between 
doing things in a lifeless and ugly fashion and doing 
them in such a way as to appeal to a man’s sense 
of beauty and order. 

People’s tastes vary considerably and what is 
satisfying to one man may not be satisfactory to 
another. There are many Jews of very deep piety 
and devotion who prefer a simple, undecorated form 
of worship, without ceremony. They regard cere- 
monial as a definite hindrance to their deep spirit- 
uality and piety. On the other hand, there is the 
opposite type of people who are emotional and 
highly esthetic, who are moved in spirit by expres- 
sive ceremonies and exquisite rites. Art, of every 
kind, appeals to them. Architecture elevates them 
and fine music rouses them to worship. 

After all, religion, if it 1s to be effective, must 
meet the world on its own ground. Imagination 
must be taken note of and its power fully exercised, 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 2738 


for religious worship cannot be left to die spirit- 
ually of cold and starvation. The world, with all 
its pageantry, its impetuous rush of life, its appeal 
to the things of sight and sense, imposes upon the 
imagination and gradually crowds out and over- 
powers the things of the spirit. It is for this reason 
that Judaism steps down into the arena and with 
its grandeur—every facet of which speaks of God— 
opposes the glamour and attraction of the gilded 
ceremonial of the world. If, therefore, certain cere- 
monials do not exactly appeal to us, we must not be 
too impatient of them but think of our neighbor and 
the influence it may have in bringing him to true 
religion. | 

Furthermore, let us bear in mind that our great 
historic observances are the unifying influences 
amongst us. It is Jewish ceremonial which feeds our 
racial consciousness and preserves our unity. When 
some Jews merely stress the ethical and universal 
side of Judaism and attempt to create a form of 
Judaism devoid of all ceremonialism, surely we can 
point out to them that even their form of Judaism, 
devoid of all specific Jewish tradition, could never 
have come into existence were it not for the tradi- 
tional Jewish life and ceremonialism of the past. 
Would Judaism have remained in existence until 
today were it not that Jews have always celebrated 
the great festival of freedom and liberty by the 
seder service; that since their political existence as 
a people ended, they have continued to mourn year 


274. JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


after year for the loss of their national life and that 
they have always continued to observe traditional 
practices which have kept them in constant touch 
with the great past of their people? 

The time may come when man, raised to the world 
of spirit, and being no longer in a frame of clay, will 
be able to dispense with ceremonies, and the words 
of one Rabbinic dictum (Niddah 61, B), “The 
Ceremonial Laws will loose their validity in the 
world to come,” will be fulfilled; but so long as man 
is mortal, these signs and memorials of his out- 
ward duties cannot possibly be dispensed with in 
his daily life. 

In connection with the desired change in our 
ritual there is another most important consideration 
we must bear in mind. There are other values in 
religion besides the intellectual value for giving us 
a truly accurate doctrine. There is the emotional 
value—something that is indefinable and escapes us 
as we try to pin it down and exactly describe it. 
Nevertheless, it is a value we all feel as we read the 
Bible and certain portions of the service. We bring 
an entirely wrong standard to some of these portions 
of traditional Jewish service if we coldly analyze 
them and treat them as scientific statements of 
theological truth; and yet, although they may even 
at times become grotesque, if we were to apply to 
them so inappropriate a standard, we feel we would 
not be without them, for they have the power of 
stirring or moving our hearts as no statement of 
abstract doctrine can possibly do. 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 275 


There are two faculties in us which we might 
specially consider—the artistic and the scientific— 
and these differ very considerably, both in intention 
and result, as well as in procedure. The artistic 
faculty works by insight and imagination. It tries 
to create a form by which it can represent the 
emotions which it pleases. It thus dwells upon 
details and, taking some aspects of nature for ex- 
ample, feels that if only it can penetrate its inner 
mysteries it can find there the very incarnation of 
reality. 

The scientific faculty works in the reverse way. 
It describes criticizes, analyzes, and dissects, and 
tests the validity of the initial art, criticizing and 
changing wherever it desires. 

Now our desires for change in the service nowa- 
days are due in many cases to the fact that the 
artistic faculty within is being crushed by the scien- 
tific. We forget that the poet’s innate selection of a 
theological truth is often at least as satisfying as the 
scientist’s deliberate choice, for it is the artistic 
faculty which first works within us. We are drawn 
to worship by a mysterious inner force within, which 
gives us an artistic representation of the divine 
which we cannot explain, and then our scientific 
faculty sets out to criticize and test the validity of 
this initial art. But let us remember that whilst the 
scientific and intellectual faculty of man is of course 
of the utmost value, at times it has proved itself a 
real hindrance. Even intellectual truth in order to 
be properly inculcated needs psychic and aesthetic 


276 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


factors, for words rarely express fully our thoughts. 
This is the reason why men have often used 
expressions in religion which, when dissected by the 
scientific faculty, seem difficult to comprehend. 
There is no doubt that the poet or artist has often 
expressed the truth much better than the theologian, 
for art is a universal language, common to all man- 
kind. It has truly been said that “cogitative words 
at best can only represent a part, art can suggest the 
whole.” Of course the ideal is the intellectual, 
psychic, and aesthetic elements all working together 
in worship which can bring man nearer to a true 
understanding of the kingdom of God. 

In order to understand this thought more clearly, 
let us take as an illustration Psalm 93, which forms 
part of the Friday evening service: 


The Lord reigneth; He is clothed in majesty; 

The Lord is clothed, He hath girded Himself with 
strength, 

Yea, the world is established, that it cannot be moved. 

Thy throne is established of old; 

Thou art from everlasting. 


The floods have lifted up, O Lord, 
The floods have lifted up their voice; 
The floods lift up their roaring, 
Above the voices of many waters, 
The mighty breakers of the sea, 

The Lord on high is mighty. 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 277 


Thy testimonies are very sure 
Holiness becometh Thy house, 
O Lord, for evermore. 


There is no doubt that few of us actually appre- 
ciate its beauty and extraordinary religious emotion- 
alism, though from the point of view of theological 
doctrine it teaches little not to be found in other 
parts of the Bible. This psalm is a doxology of God, 
the majestic King who reigns supreme, and was read 
on the sixth day of the week in the temple, because 
some of its phrases point to the fixed order con- 
nected with the work of creation which God, having 
completed on the sixth day, began to reign over. 
God has proclaimed himself King, and whatever 
opposition may arise his throne is unmoved; He has 
reigned, does reign, and will reign forever. No mat- 
ter how His foes may rage, the eternal King, clothed 
in His regal apparel, ascends His lofty throne, and 
as His subjects see the King in His beauty, they pro- 
claim with joy, “JHVH is King.” Furthermore, as 
men gird up their loins for running or working, so 
God appears to His people, girded with His omnipo- 
tence and ready for action. 

The very fact that God is King in heaven gives 
terrestrial things stability. LLawlessness is the result 
of godlessness. So long as God reigns there is 
security for humanity, but when He withdraws His 
presence, lawlessness and chaos dominate. But 
again, the psalmist sees some great-world powers 
threatening to overspread the world and he sym- 


278 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


bolizes them by the rivers. “Sometimes men are 
furious in words—they lift up their voice; and at 
other times they rise to acts of violence—they lift 
up their waves; but the Lord has control over them 
in either case.” The ungodly are all foam and fury, 
noise and bluster, during their little hour, and then 
the tide turns or the storm is hushed, and we hear 
no more of them; while the kingdom of the eternal 
abides in the grandeur of its power, for God is 
“mightier than many waters” and all their noise is 
to Him but a sound. Finally, God’s testimonies are 
very sure. His revelation is beyond question: “As 
the rock remains unmoved amid the tumult of the 
sea, so does divine truth resist all the currents of 
man’s opinion and the storm of human controversy.” 

As we rest from our mental and physical toil on 
the Sabbath day and reflect during the period of 
rest and worship on the storm-tossed world in which 
we live, and the rebellious opposition of lawlessness 
which still exists in this twentieth century, we 
acknowledge as Jews that the stability of the world 
is due to God’s supremacy over all forms of nature. 
And so no matter how high the waters of affliction 
may be, or how great our difficulties may have been 
during the week, “the Lord on High is mightier than 
they.” 

The systematic theologian with no sense of 
poetry may weave the material round some of our 
hymns into a consistent bit of theology which will 
move you to ridicule instead of inspiring you, and 


Oe ne 


‘ 
x 
| 
| 
| 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 279 


yet somehow, when you sing these hymns in the 
synagogue, surrounded by other worshipers, do you 
not feel that your heart is stirred and uplifted and 
swayed by them? You feel that it is poetry that 
you are singing, not theology, and the thrill that 
goes through you with the swing and beauty of the 
music, and with the singing of the vast multitude, is 
fittingly matched by such language, for its poetic 
description of God and nature goes back to the very 
dawn of human thought. You are not ashamed, 
therefore, of singing the hymn with all your reli- 
gious fervor and enthusiasm, for you feel that it 
appeals to something within you other than your 
cold, abstract reason. 

Let us illustrate this further by the Kol Nidrei. 
It is true that, in spite of the importance which is 
attached to it by traditional Jews, much can be 
said in favor of its being omitted from the liturgy. 
It is by no means one of the oldest portions of 
the prayer-book and many former Rabbis of distinc- 
tion have doubted the advisability of its inclusion 
in the Yom Kippur service. In the ninth century 
we hear that the Jewish authorities were not at all 
agreed about its adoption. Whilst Rabbi Paltoi 
Gaon was in its favor, five distinguished Rabbis 
were opposed to it. Similarly, Rab Amram, in his 
famous Siddur, belittles the importance attached to 
the Kol Nidrei. Why is it then that the Kol Nidrei 
has such a powerful hold on so many Jews, even 
those who perhaps are usually known as “Yom 


280 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


Kippur Jews?” Why is it that it impresses the least 
impressible of worshipers? Is it not due to two 
considerations—the historical circumstances con- 
nected with its first introduction into the Eve of 
Atonement service, and, above all, the melody. 
During the persecution of the Jews in Spain the 
Roman Catholic Church often extracted a promise 
from the Jews to abjure their religion upon penalty 
of death. One can imagine these poor Jews yearning 
for intercourse with their brothers, Jews at heart in 
every sense of the term, and still having been com- 
pelled to declare openly their severance from the 
Jewish people. These renegades were particularly 
anxious to join their brethren in worship at least 
once a year. How were they to be absolved from 
the promise which they had made to leave Jews and 
Judaism entirely? We can easily understand how 
the practice arose for the heads of the community 
as its representatives to beg permission from all to 
pray with the renegades who would come stealing 
into the synagogue on the eve of the Day of Atone- 
ment. There may be no renegades entering the 
synagogue now, but the Kol Nidrei has still its 
lesson to teach the Jew. We read in the Bible that 
“When a man voweth or sweareth an oath to bind 
his soul with a bond, he shall not break his word, 
he shall do according to all that proceedeth out of 
his mouth.” The vow was to the Jew something to 
be scrupulously observed. And the Kol Nidrei can 
still be regarded as a testimony of the sacredness 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 281 


which the Jew has always attached to a promise. 
But the main importance attached to the Kol 
Nidrei seems to be due primarily to the influence 
of its haunting melody, which has become classical: 
“The shrill crescendo near the beginning, the stac- 
cato notes in the middle, and the cry of triumph at 
the end—who, that has heard them once, can ever 
forget their magic?” 

The Hebrew language, Jewish ceremonial, and 
Jewish tradition and observance are the only means 
by which our religious tie can be maintained. They 
are the only means by which the brotherhood of all 
Jews can be preserved, keeping us apart from the 
members of other religious denominations and yet 
in no way preventing our living with them in the 
completest harmony and sympathy. Hebrew has 
always acted as a bond, uniting the Jews throughout 
the world; it has been one of the main forces pre- 
venting our extinction as a people. We are told in 
Rabbinic literature that one of the reasons why 
Israel deserved to be redeemed from Egypt was 
their retention of Hebrew as their language. Our 
national language has done much to save us from 
race extinction, and without it our racial conscious- 
ness would disappear. 

What is the meaning of the attempts made in 
some circles to reduce Hebrew in our service to a 
minimum, if not to eliminate it entirely? We are 
constantly being told that it is preferable to pray 
devoutly in the vernacular which the worshiper 


282 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


understands than in a language which he does not 
follow. But surely the substitution of English for 
Hebrew in our synagogue services will never solve 
our religious difficulties. How can we be true and 
faithful Jews without knowing our ancestral tongue? 
How can we regard the Bible as a literature 
peculiarly our own without knowing or understand- 
ing the language in which it was written? Surely 
the claims of Hebrew are so inextricably bound with 
our Jewish life and thought that we cannot abolish 
one without doing away with the other. And, curi- 
ously enough, the desire to eliminate Hebrew from 
the studies of our children comes at a time when 
there are so many movements on foot for the revival 
of ancient tongues. Many small European peoples, 
whose contributions to the world are but nought 
compared to ours, are reviving their national lan- 
guage with the utmost enthusiasm and teaching it 
to their children with the utmost pride. Why are 
Jewish parents eliminating Hebrew everywhere from 
its place in our educational system? We are told 
that the curriculum of our schools is so overcrowded 
that there is actually no time for Hebrew study and 
that the subjects that our children learn must be 
confined to those which are essential for success in 
life. But surely we cannot expect our children to 
be successful in maintaining a Jewish consciousness 
and an interest in things Jewish if they are utterly 
ignorant of our sacred language. Our Jewish girls 
cannot be expected to become true mothers in 





SHOULD WE CHANGE OUR SERVICE? 283 


Israel if, in spite of all the time they spend in 
acquiring those accomplishments which modern life 
demands, there is no attempt made to find some 
time for Hebraic studies. 

We see, therefore, as a result of our discussion, 
that in order to succeed in our efforts to understand 
the traditional Jewish service, we need more than a 
mere cursory knowledge of Jewish theology. We 
need to have a knowledge of the Hebrew language 
and to think not only of its theological doctrines, 
but also of that element of emotional value in which 
the service is couched, which does not suffer itself to 
be defined in a precise way, but 1s an atmosphere 
that we must drink in, feeling that it fills and 
irradiates our souls. Though the language of some 
of our prayers may not work into our schemes of 
theology or lend itself to a scientific statement of 
doctrine, nevertheless we feel that it speaks to some- 
thing within our hearts. It is deeper than all our 
reasons; it touches us at the very elemental basis of 
our being, and, as we read or chant these words, they 
stimulate us with an emotion which can neither be 
understood nor explained by the cold reasoned facts 
of theology. 

We must conclude this discussion by observing 
that whilst there are numerous difficulties in the 
practice of traditional Judaism in the Diaspora, they 
have not arisen out of the essence of Judaism itself. 
They are practical difficulties which stand in the 
way of living the Jewish life. Surrounded every- 


284 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


where as the Jew is by an un-Jewish and, in many 
places, an anti-Jewish environment, obstacles are 
constantly presenting themselves which prevent his 
leading a truly Jewish life. But if many of the 
teachers of Judaism not only realized themselves, 
but also taught their flocks, that those fundamentals 
and ethical values taught by our religion cannot be 
possibly preserved unless they find expression in 
practical observance, there would be much stronger 
resistance—even in the hostile environment by 
which the Jew is surrounded—to the temptations to 
which he succumbs at present. 





CHAPTER X 


SUMMARY 


Much that passes for Judaism nowadays is “morality touched 
with emotion”—Cause of chaos of American Jewry due to 
lack of authority—Failure to rationalize Judaism—Solid 
foundations of traditional Judaism—Need to interpret the old 
truths of Judaism in contemporary language—Development is 
not synonymous with reform—Necessity for a “reasoned” 
sympathy with Judaism—‘“Present renaissance” in Hebrew 
learning may lead to higher appreciation of true spirit of 
Judaism. 


THERE are many movements in American Israel 
today, all of which claim to stand for the conserva- 
tion of Judaism, and we are tempted to ask the 
adherents of these movements whether they mean 
thereby a Jewish conservation or merely the con- 
servation of a Judaism withered of its essential 
characteristics, so that it 1s barely recognizable from 
any other faith. Matthew Arnold’s famous defini- 
tion of religion as “‘morality touched with emotion” 
is not an untrue description of much that passes 
for Judaism in the eyes of many Jews nowadays. 
There are of course wide circles in which much more 
than this is alive, but there is a widespread 
deficiency of intellectual grip as well as of definite 
devotional practice. 

Pascal was right after all when he said that there 

285 


286 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


are two attitudes and two only which are worthy 
of a reasonable man—either to serve God with his 
whole heart because he knows Him, or to seek Him 
with his whole heart because he knows Him not. 
Disbelief in traditional Jewish practice seems to 
be the fashion today, and to observe even occasion- 
ally some traditional Jewish ceremonies seems to 
very many intelligent Jews a confession of weak- 
ness and obsolete mentality, needing apology and a 
decent reticence. In the words of one writer, “They 
feel that they have got beyond the traditional cere- 
monialism of Judaism and come out on the other 
side.” Amongst the Jews in England and America, 
there seems everywhere a feeling of uncertainty and 
bewilderment, and it has rightly been said that the 
Great War and its experiences have shattered the 
very foundations of traditional Jewish life in 
Eastern Europe and have had the effect of weaken- 
ing many a Jew’s liberal faith in progress without 
strengthening his faith in God. The tragedy is that 
this hopeless uncertainty which characterizes Jewish 
life of today has caused many Jews to regard any 
form of positive creed with distaste, and as a result 
they have drifted away from all forms of belief. 
The traditional Jew has thus been for some time a 
persona non grata in the so-called higher circles of 
American Jewish life. Again, the danger to Judaism 
in this country does not lie in any actual change of 
beliefs but in a sluggish indifference, resulting from 
that betterment of our material civilization which 





SUMMARY 287 


is causing so many Amercian Jews to consort with 
any belief. Society 1s pleasure-seeking and indiffer- 
ent; the industrial world ill-guided and in a state of 
transition which involves a certain antagonism to 
recognized tradition. Political thought seems in 
utter confusion, giving little sense of confidence or 
security. Science in its strides seems only to sap the 
old positions without substituting any acceptable 
alternative. What seems curious is that many Jews 
who proudly declare that they refuse to be terrified 
by one form of authority are so readily terrified by 
another. They reject with contempt the religious 
authority of traditional Judaism but readily accept 
in its place some of the most absurd oracles of the 
day. 

We need to realize the value of the symbolic, the 
figurative, and the decorative beauty of the archaic. 
Words of the earlier centuries may not always 
appear apt for minds of today but the spirit behind 
them is the same, and the retention of these old 
formulae and prayers has great value in preserving 
the long continuity of Jewish worship and tradition, 
and in linking us with those of previous ages who, 
with the same. ills and the same adversities and the 
same faults as ourselves, have approached the same 
God. 

If we set to work to rationalize expressions of 
idealism and erect a structure which will receive the 
approval of the cultured few and satisfy the worldly 
wisdom of a utilitarian age, our efforts are doomed 


288 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


to failure. Many trees may appear untidy, can- 
kered, gnarled, and split, the mountainside is full of 
flaws and useless cracks and broken rock, but can we 
imitate the beauty of a tree or the glory of a moun- 
tain by ingenious workmanship? If Judaism is to 
become a living force in this country, if it is to exert 
its influence not merely over the docile children of 
orthodoxy but over the multitudes, the synagogue 
as a living force must recover its capacity and moral 
right to speak with authority in the name of the 
living God. The cause of the chaos into which 
American Israel has fallen is due largely to the lack 
of authority, and American Jews in their attempts 
to progress in Judaism have progressed from it. We 
must realize that authority is the inevitable form 
under which education and social training invariably 
begin, for in every sphere of human interest and in 
every relationship of human life, whether we deal 
with the spheres of religion or morality or human 
culture generally, the individual must begin by sit- 
ting at the feet of tradition if he is to enter into any 
spiritual inheritance which is of value. The failure 
of many Jews in their attempts to rationalize 
Judaism is due primarily to two causes. In the 
first place, they do not realize that religion, as such, 
can never be fully understood. There is more in 
religion than can be in any adequate sense grasped 
by the mind, and this accounts for the fact that it 
must always speak in the language of metaphor and 
symbol. In the words of one religious thinker, “A 





SUMMARY 289 


God who is wholly unknown, of course, could not be 
worshiped, but a God who is completely understood 
would be no longer a possible object of worship.” 
An attempt, therefore, to rationalize Judaism 
by turning it into a philosophy means to turn 
it into something other than itself. Secondly, 
we must always bear in mind that Judaism is a 
positive and historical religion and cannot be 
fully understood independently of its own historical 
tradition. 

There is no doubt that on the whole the mind of 
the younger generation is dissatisfied with the imme- 
diate past. It is particularly dissatisfied with sec- 
tarianism, with party cries and catchwords. It seeks 
a faith to live by and it is disposed to suspect that 
truth is somehow to be found in the faith of our 
fathers. There is a profound respect for sincerity 
and whole-heartedness and a readiness to recognize 
that religion, if it is to mean anything, must in the 
last resort mean everything. 

We are constantly being told that with the 
development of modern thought traditional Judaism 
is doomed, and some have even argued that the very 
props and pillars by which our religion has been 
buttressed have given way entirely and traditional 
Judaism is thus left without any solid foundation. 
It is for us to examine this assertion. Are we 
justified in arguing that, because a system is devoid 
of “solid foundation,” in the popular sense of the 
term, it is therefore possessed of no stability? It 


290 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


has been pointed out by many scientists, and often 
emphasized by Sir Oliver Lodge, that it is the 
absence of material foundation that makes the earth 
itself so secure, and the absence of anything that 
may crumble or decay is a safeguard rather than a 
danger. We might be anxious about the stability 
and durability of the earth if it were based upon a 
pedestal or otherwise solidly supported. As it is, it 
floats securely in the emptiness of space. Further- 
more, the persistence of its diurnal spin is not main- 
tained by any special mechanism, but by the absence 
of anything to stop it. Again, the body of scientific 
truth rests on no solitary material fact or group of 
facts but on a basis of harmony and consistency 
between facts. The very basis of our adherence to 
traditional Judaism lies in the fact that, whilst it 
takes account of the rational, the physical, and the 
historical, it is not based specifically on any one of 
those, and yet it is based on all of these; like the 
city in “Gareth and Lynette,” of which it was said. 


The city is built 
To music, therefore never built at all 
And therefore built forever. 


The very strength of traditional Judaism lies in 
the fact that it is not based on the “solid founda- 
tion” of certain “historical events’ connected with 
the life of any individual or movement, and whilst 
these Jewish edifices which our fathers raised are 
certainly based on the Torah and on the history of 





CG... S445 * ores, 


.<- a 


SUMMARY 291 


our people and on reason, they are also based on 
man’s nature as a whole. 

We Jews must realize that if we are to succeed in 
our search for truth we must learn to rely upon and 
trust not only our powers of abstract reasoning but 
the whole of our faculties. The whole of our mental 
and spiritual capacities must be trained if we are 
to be true to the whole of reality. If one denies 
that there is any beauty in vibrating catgut and 
iron, we cannot prove to him that he is wrong. All 
that we can ask him to do is to listen to a violin 
sonata. A priggish precision of expression is quite 
unsuited to worship, and ancient expressions, 
phrases, and formulx, some of which have been in 
use for centuries must be respected, for words and 
phrases can touch the emotion as music can, without 
being too closely scrutinized by the intellect. 

By all means let us do our utmost for the con- 
servation of Judaism, but the Judaism which we 
conserve must not be a Judaism devoid of its essen- 
tial characteristics and distinctive features. It must 
be a Jewish Judaism and our conservation must be a 
Jewish conservation. 

But how can we expect our modern young men 
and women to remain with us when even the 
spiritual food that might satisfy their souls is offered 
to them in a most unacceptable manner? We need 
to interpret some of the old truths of Judaism in 
fresh and contemporary language so as to arouse 
new springs of emotion and reveal heights which 


292 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


have never been glimpsed before. One feels at times 
that the attitude of some of our young people toward 
traditional Judaism is the attitude of those who 
would take reprisals on a weakened tyrant. 

Hitherto our Rabbis have been content to cater 
only to simple believers, whilst little, if anything, 
has been done for the growing population of adults 
of both sexes possessing questioning minds. Our 
young people, particularly, may pass through a stage 
of inner scepticism or overt denial. They may for 
the time being abandon many Jewish practices. 
Nevertheless, respect for personality demands that 
their implicit assertion of intellectual maturity and 
freedom should not be discouraged but welcomed. 
It is especially during the period that they are 
thinking for themselves that we need to give them 
all the intellectual and spiritual help they are will- 
ing to accept toward an understanding of the 
rational basis of the doctrines and practices which 
they were taught at an earlier stage “on authority.” 
They must be taught that if they hold fast and are 
intellectually both candid and humble they will be 
enabled eventually once more to return to positive 
convictions, with the advantage this time that their 
faith will be based on knowledge and will thus be 
considerably strengthened. 

What then are the general lines on which we, as 
Jews and modern men, aspire to move? We are 
fundamentally Jews, belonging to the great body of 





SUMMARY 293 


catholic Israel. We are convinced that Judaism is a 
thoroughly social and corporate religion. We can- 
not recognize as adequately Jewish the religion of 
any soul that is not possessed through and through 
with the sense of belonging to a definite religious 
Jewish body. We value most highly historical con- 
tinuity, for we feel that whilst Judaism may pass 
through many changes, all this is a result of genuine 
growth and vital development from phase to phase. 
We desire to swim in the main stream of Jewish 
history. There is a great stream of religious tradi- 
tion running through the centuries which forms the 
historical embodiment and manifestation of the 
fundamental Jewish tradition and outlook. Within 
that tradition we desire to live our spiritual life, and 
its atmosphere we would breathe. We want to 
cleave fast to the deepest religious convictions of 
traditional Judaism, even when we find it necessary 
to modernize radically their intellectual expression. 
And we would never abandon or change any of the 
old ceremonies, symbols, or forms of service, except 
in so far as the need is clearly proved. So much on 
the conservative side. 

Yet we have the forward-looking gaze. We wish 
to see a development in Jewish thought and prac- 
tice. But development to us is not synonymous 
with reform. We cannot consider any change in 
Judaism which would mean cutting ourselves away 
from catholic Israel and severing our connection 


294 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


with the continuity of Jewish historical develop- 
ment. As modern thinking men and women we 
realize the necessity of harmonizing traditional 
Judaism with modern thought, and of employing 
new categories by which the substance of old doc- 
trines are to be stated to the intellectual satisfaction 
of our generation. As Dr. Hadfield well points out,’ 
“the source of power lies not in an instinctive emo- 
tion alone, but in an instinctive emotion expressed 
in a way with which the whole man can, for the time 
being at least, identify himself. Ultimately, this is 
impossible without the achievement of a harmony of 
all the instincts and the approval of the reason.” 

We wish to have a “reasoned sympathy” with 
Judaism. In the. words of one writer, “The man 
who has looked all the facts in the face, and emerged 
at length into the light of a glorious certainty, he is 
the man who can afford to lay down his life for the 
cause. For him sacrifice is no leap in the dark; he 
knows it is infinitely worth while. He has no mis- 
givings that all will turn out to be a dream. Reason 
is no more a traitorous guide. She is his trusted ally. 
With her help he has seen the ground of faith, he 
has found the map of life; joyfully now will he 
become the servant and guide of those who are still 
wandering in the trackless wilderness.” 

Finally, we are prepared to agree that the right 
of every congregation to worship as it pleases is 
indisputable as a maxim of civil society, but surely 

1 The Spirit, edited by B. H. Streeter, p. 93. 





SUMMARY 295 


this right of judgment must depend upon the pains 
taken by the congregation to arrive at its decision 
by adequate and earnest inquiry. We realize how 
absurd and impious it is for each of us to go off into 
his separate hole and corner and there exercise his 
own private judgment. No man can evolve a satis- 
factory religion solely out of his own inner conscious- 
ness. We feel, therefore, if traditional Judaism is 
to be successful in this country, there must be union 
of effort amongst the various congregations working 
for that end. This is not due to any quasi-political 
scheme, but is the result of the deep passionate 
longing of many hearts. 

Our hope for union lies not in repressing varia- 
tions, but in making them non-essential, so that this 
synthesis and unity should cause no difficulty to con- 
eregations which have no particularly deep or seri- 
ous grounds for divergence. Furthermore, we feel 
this desire for unity not merely on account of our 
dislike of heterogeneity, but owing to our irritation 
at the narrow parochialism and cliquishness, at the 
spectacle of innumerable little ineffective groups 
where we ought to have breadth of vision and union 
of effort. 

As we look back over history, we note that many 
of the great revivals of religion have been preceded 
by a “renaissance,” a deeper understanding of the 
meanings of the past, a more glowing realization of 
the powers of man, and humble recognition that 
mankind needs deeper faith in an Almighty God. 


296 JUDAISM AND THE MODERN MIND 


We sincerely pray, therefore, that the recent devel- 

opments in Palestine, and the revival of an interest 

in Hebrew and Hebrew culture, may mean also a 

deeper understanding and higher appreciation of the 
true spirit of Judaism and Jewish thought. 





INDEX 


Abraham, 50f, 56, 85, 109. 

Abrahams, Israel, 112. 

Agnosticism, 11. 

Akiba, R., 219. 

Amos, 70. 

Amram, R., 279. 

Aristotle, Ethics of, 152. 

Astarte, worship of, 86. 

Authorities, original, 216f. 

Authority and reason, 240. 

Authority of Jewish tradition, 
meiie 

Authority, value of, 288. 


Baal, worship of, 86. 

Babylon, 72, 187, 220. 

Babylonia, 86, 192. 

Babylonians, 57, 66. 

Bacon, 24. 

Balfour, 240. 

Bible and kindness to animals, 
89. 

Bible and the social state, 61. 

Bible as literature, 53. 

Bible, infallibility of, 116. 


Bible, revival of interest in, 48. 


Bible, womanhood in, 77. 
Brotherhood, 35. 

Buchler, Adolph, 50. 
Buddhism, 20. 

Butler, 24. 


Canaanites, 66, 85f, 96. 
Capitalism, 30. 


Carlyle, 25, 106. 
Ceremonies, 269f. 
Chanina b. Dosa, 139. 
Charity, 64. 

Chastity, 77, 79. 

Chinese, 20. 

Choni Hammaagel, 139. 
Christianity, 21, 87, 112. 
Chronicles, 196. 
Communism, 33. 
Confucius, 20. 

Copernicus, 40. 

Creation, narrative of, 119. 
Criticism, Biblical, 165. 
Crookes, Sir William, 137. 


Dancing, 53. 

Darmesteter, James, 37. 

David, 53, 56, 59, 68, 96, 106, 
1 WG 

Deborah, 57, 85, 104. 

Delitzsch, 175. 

Descartes, 24, 25. 


Elijah, 68, 69, 140, 149. 
Elisha, 69, 149. 

Essenes, 218. 

Ethical Culture, 20. 

Ethics without religion, 20. 
Ezekiel, 74, 77, 142, 168, 192. 
Ezra, 178, 196, 207. 


Faculties of man, 5. 
Fire, kindling on Sabbath, 205. 


297 


298 


Fraser, James G., 18. 
Freedom, festival of, 273. 
Freud, 149f. 


Galileo, 40. 

Gemara, 220, 224. 
Gemorrah, 49. 

Genesis, 119. 

Gentiles, pious, 105. 
Gilgamesh, story of, 57, 
Ginzberg, Louis, 113. 


Haeckel, 41. 
Haggadah, 105. 
Haggai, 205. 
Halacha, 105. 
Halévy, 170. 
Hammurabi, 66. 
Harnack, 161. 


Hat, wearing of, in synagogue, 


254. 
Hebrew, importance of, 282. 
Hegel, 13. 
Hellenism, 79. 
Hezekiah, 75. 
Higher Criticism, 165. 
Hilkiah, 168. 
Hillel, 52, 139. 
Hobhouse, L. T., 4. 
Hoffmann, D., 170. 
Hommel, 170. 
Horace, 59. 
Hosea, 71, 80. 
Hume, 24. 
Huxley, 11, 57, 228. 


Ibn Ezra, 176. 

Idolatry, 79. 

Imagining, power of, 268, 272f. 
Immortality, belief in, 252f. 
Individualism, 29. 

Inspiration, 27, 187, 197f. 
Instinct, religious, 16. 

Isaiah, 15, 72. 


INDEX 


Israel, prophets of, 22, 35. 
Israel, unity of, 268. 
Israel, wandering, 148. 


Jacob, 53, 109. 

Jamnia, 209. 

Jehuda Halevi, 264. 
Jehuda Hanasi, 219. 
Jephthah, 104. 
Jeremiah, 72, 73, 206. 
Jerusalem, 73. 

Jethro, 61. 

Job, 192. 
Jochanan b. Zakkai, 209. 
Jonah, 125, 142, 146. 
Jonathan, 59. 

Joseph, 55, 56, 78. 
Josephus, 78. 

Joshua, 125, 142. 

Joshua b. Chanania, 12. 
Jubal, 53. 

Jubilee, year of, 63. 
Justice, 34f, 61, 67, 71, 76, 83. 


Kant, Immanuel, 12. 
Kimchi, 176. 
Kina measure, 60. 


Kol Nidrei, 279f. 


Laban, 53. 

Lamentations, Book of, 60. 
Language as fossil poetry, 141. 
Law, oral and written, 208. 
Legalism of Bible, 174. 
Liberty, 263. 

Liberty, Festival of, 273. 
Literature, Bible as, 58f. 
Liturgy, language of, 268. 
Livy, 216. 

Loans without interest, 63. 
Locke, 24, 131. 

Lodge, Sir Oliver, 131, 290. 
Love, 34, 82. 





INDEX 


Maccabean War, 206. 
Maimonides, 176, 224, 253. 
Materialism, 10, 11. 

Meir, 219. 

Mendelssohn, 138, 263. 
Micah, 71. 

Midrash, 105. 


~ Mill, John Stuart, 135. 


Milton, 107, 171. 

Mind, modern, 3, 4, 5, 10. 

Minhag, 265. 

Miracles, 125f. 

Miracles, attitude of Rabbis to, 
138f. 

Miriam, 53, 85. 

Mishnah, 210f. 

Monism, theory of, 41. 

Morality and religion, 20. 

Moses, 52, 56, 61, 180. 

Miller, Max, 16, 108. 

Music, in ancient Israel, 53. 


Nachmanides, 176. 

National elements of Judaism, 
262. 

Nehemiah, 63, 196. 

Nietzsche, 96. 

Nineveh, 146f. 


Palestine, 
295. 

Pentateuch, criticism of, 167, 
173, 178f. 

Pentateuch, morality of, 49, 78, 
97. 

Personality, power of, 159. 

Pharisees, 52, 174, 218f. 


192, 204, 209, 221, 


Philanthropy of the Bible, 62. 


Pindar, 59. 

Poetry of the Bible, 58. 
Polygamy, 96, 109f. 
Pratt, 17. 


299 


Prayer Book, 266. 

Progress, wrong notion of, 260. 
Prophetism, 159. 

Prophets, 35, 69. 

Proverbs, 58, 192. 

Psalms, 59, 192. 

Psalms, imprecatory, 107f. 


Reason and authority, 231f. 

Reason in religion, 232. 

Reason, use of, 4. 

Reasoned sympathy with Juda- 
ism, 294. 

Revelation, 100, 156f, 187f. 

Robertson, Smith, 166, 244. 

Ruth, 58. 


Sabbath, observance of, 205. 

Sabbatical year, 63. 

Sacrifices, 71. 

Sadducees, 218. 

Samson, 56. 

Samuel, 56, 69. 

Sarah, 85. 

Saul, 56. 

Sayce, 170. 

Schechter, 113, 139, 175, 223, 
245. 

Science and religion, 38f, L13f. 

Septuagint, 167. 

Shamma, 139. 

Shoes, removal of, 254. 

Shulchan Aruch, 224. 

Slavery, 96. 

Social unrest, 28. 

Socialism, 28, 30, 31, 33. 

Socialist, Jewish, 32. 

Sodom, 49, 51. 

Solomon, 58, 68, 177. 

Spencer, Herbert, 11, 12, 14, 234. 

Spinoza, 15, 25. 

Spiritual sense, 261. 


300 INDEX 


Stranger, attitude toward, 74ff. Torah, 156, 203, 223, 249f, 290. 
Suggestion and auto-suggestion, Toy, 174. 


150. Tradition, 176f. 
Symbolical interpretations of 
Bible, 151. Wedding customs, 82. 
Symbols, 269, 287. Wellhausen, 166, 173f. 
Syndicalism, 31, 33. Widow, sympathy for, 83. 
Wiener, 170. 
Talmud, 79, 105, 112, 140, 168, Woman, consideration for, 84f. 
Pali nnoe, Womanhood in the Bible, 771. 
Taylor, H. O., 4. 
Theocracy, 74. Zion, Prayer for, 266. 


Tolstoi, 55. Zionist, Poalei, 28. 











